Bee Movie and a Happy Meal: My Eco-Dream Comes True?
by Kenny Luna, North Babylon, NY on 10.30.07
I’ve got to be honest, there’s no end to the intrigue when marketing guru’s at big companies everywhere start sensing the opportunity to capitalize on the growing green movement.
So call me a skeptic, but I am really enjoying the process of observing the latest cooperation between the makers of “Bee Movie” and the people at McDonald’s, with Conservation International thrown in for good measure.
Apparently, they’re all cooperating to get kids to go outside, exercise, and “Bee Good to the Planet”. Well, that sounds just fine to me… Though I must confess to a certain bit of wonderment at the idea of pushing a cheeseburger and a movie as a part of going green.
I guess maybe I’m old-fashioned, but I liked my cheeseburgers better when I knew they were unhealthy, and the company pushing them on me didn’t try to divert my attention from the fact with clever marketing schemes to save the planet.
And admittedly, I imagine I should just “Bee Happy” that it’s Jerry Seinfeld’s new movie we’re talking about and that he’s finally back on-screen; though somehow I just don’t believe this latest marketing collaboration will change the world…
See also:: A Search for the Greenest Grade School in America Leaves My Stomach Churning
via:: press release
Swing With The Plants by Marcel Wanders
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mcdonalds is terrible. ill never forgive them for having little plastic hummers in their happy meals.
and all the fatness theyre responsible for.
yeah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
kids don't eat burgers in their happy meals anymore, they eat nuggets. wait, i think i missed the point.
If McDonald's, Seinfeld, Bee Movie, and Conservation International really wanted to do something worthwhile, they should do something to address Colony Collapse Syndrome which threatens the existence of honey bees and thus the productivity of most agriculture. It is highly probably that CCS is connected to pesticides, environmental pollution, climate change, and/or emergent diseases. Tougher to tackle that in a cartoon or Happy Meal I guess.
Excellent point. I would be interested to see if some of the traditional media sources have picked up on this and are seeing how questionable this whole marketing ploy is. Considering how hard Madison Avenue is working to get the "conscious consumer" it would be particularly interesting to see a piece on this in say Brand Week..or the like. I think this just comes to show you how wrong marketers are still getting it...and how "awake at the wheel" this market actually is.
Julia Fenster
Editor, The Lohasian
http://www.thelohasian.com
Excellent point. I would be interested to see if some of the traditional media sources have picked up on this and are seeing how questionable this whole marketing ploy is. Considering how hard Madison Avenue is working to get the "conscious consumer" it would be particularly interesting to see a piece on this in say Brand Week..or the like. I think this just comes to show you how wrong marketers are still getting it...and how "awake at the wheel" this market actually is.
Julia Fenster
Editor, The Lohasian
http://www.thelohasian.com
Thank you for writing about this! I received so many press releases about CI teaming up with McDonald's, and it just gave me the heeby jeebies.
They claim that instead of reaching an audience that they can already reach, teaming with McDonald's allows them to reach the masses.
But I'm not sure if partnering with a company with clearly opposite goals is a positive move.
See Rebecca, that's very much how I feel... And I think that groups like CI are going to have to take it on a case by case basis. There's the carrot for them of reaching a broader group with their message and "brand name", but then there's the stick of potentially losing some of their own reputation in the process if they go too far or partner with the wrong people. This whole thing with Bee Movie and McDonald's just seemed like a stretch to me, though it's far better than the "Search for the Greenest Grade School in America" sponsored by Unilever to promote their detergent 'all' I posted about not too long ago...
For groups like CI it's really a dual issue... First there is the reality that they want to reach the broadest group possible with a positive message, but when you look at who they're targeting with a happy meal and movie tie-in, it's really kids... And that's a direct function of the fact that they need to maintain and grow their donor base. Because realistically speaking, kids are going to one day grow up and potentially write the checks that keep their org. running.
I don't feel it's necessary to really come down on McDonald's for including green "tips" and the like besides sort of wryly pointing out the wonderment of it all because it's relatively harmless, though definitely capable of giving us both the heebie jeebies...
But certainly the "Greenest Grade School in America" campaign by Unilever made (and still makes) my blood boil.
And if you want to see just how much I mean that, click the link to my post on that one below, and then read it and the comments I left as well...
-kenny
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/10/a_search_for_th.php
Lol... CCS is a skate shop.. but wtf... bees are important. They help argiculture and such. McDonalds can't POSSIBLY be thinking about green, i mean, really... they need to think about OBESITY if that want to help. They're the main cause of it atm.
i disagree McDonalds isnt to blame for masses of peple being over wieght. not compleatly people need to chose not to eat there on their own. i dont like big corpiration or anything but understand that they cant force you or anyone to eat there food daily and not work out. that is the persons problem not the companys
The funniest contradiction to me is the "be concerned about the environment" message coupled with another piece of plastic crap: the happy meal toy.