One
situation any company or organization doesn’t want to get into is a
finger-pointing predicament because of a simple mistake. Coca-Cola made a
simple mistake. March 29 Coca-Cola had an outside ad agency stencil “ads for Coca-Cola Zero on flagstone sidewalk panels and
cement surfaces in the French Quarter, the Central Business District and
Treme,” according to Steve Goldstein’s article on prnewsonline.com, around
the Final Four host city, New Orleans. The company didn’t check if it was okay
with the city and “the stunt violated multiple city
ordinances. New Orleans forced Coke to power-wash all the logos away by Friday
afternoon,” according to Michael McCarthy’s article on usatoday.com.
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| Picture is from the USA Today article |
The accidental violation isn’t the major reason that Coke
received public backlash. According to McCarthy’s article, “The iconic French
Quarter is treated as a living museum by New Orleans residents.” It seems that
Coca-Cola did no research for this project. Strictly speculating, it seems to
me that if the company would have asked permission to put up the stencils the
city probably would have told them “yes, just don’t put them in the French
Quarter,” and explain to the company why. It’s not safe to assume anything. I’m
sure that Washington D.C. and Austin, Texas have city ordinances for street
advertisement as well simply because they are major cities and need those
ordinances to keep the city in order.
Coke also blamed the illegal advertising on the outside ad
agency. Now, in the PRSA Code of Ethics it says, “We are accountable for our
actions.” Coca-Cola spokesman Jefferson Parish is quoted in Goldstein’s article
saying, “Essentially there was a miscommunication between our (New York
advertising) agency of what the permit that they saw from the city allowed, but
it was clearly a miscommunication on the part of our agency.” Coca-Cola hired
this company. How do you not know where your money is going? If I hired a
company to run a campaign for product I would want a detailed plan of what’s
going to happen and how much it’s going to cost. It just seems like the easy way
out to use a smaller outsourced company as a scapegoat in a legal ordeal. In my
opinion, Coca-Cola actually made the situation more negative than it had to be
by pointing its finger.
The public didn’t have to many nice things to say about the matter
either. In McCarthy’s article an excerpt from Paul Lukas’ of ESPN.com Uni Watch
blog said that Coke, “Outsourc[ed] the dirty work to some small-timers and then
hang them out to dry when the s--- hits the fan, all while feigning surprise
and regret over the way things turned out.” This is the reaction most people
had upon hearing the story, and with good reason. The Coca-Cola brand is huge,
but its action mimics those of a child.
The lesson from this mistake, if you are going out of town
to do a guerilla ad campaign check with the city to see what is legal and what
is a violation. If you still make a mistake after the research is done then own
up to it. You’ll get more respect for it.
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