On the first day of Pride month, it rebranded its classifieds section to #TimesOutAndProud, featuring personal announcements by LGBTQ+ people. As a mainstream platform – and India’s leading English-language daily – The Times of India realised it could help a marginalised community claim their space in society. As a WARC Best Practice piece on employee engagement reads: “Having a purpose that goes beyond the benefit of the service or product itself is one of the most valuable qualities a brand can have.” Amplifying marginalised voicesĮven after the Supreme Court decriminalised homosexuality in 2018, India was far from being a country accepting of the LGBTQ+ community. This paper shows the social and business impact a company can achieve when it successfully gets its employees to rally behind its purpose. With no investment in media, the campaign achieved more than a billion impressions and 72,000 mentions, increasing positive perceptions of Coke by 10 percentage points. Social posts displaying the cans quickly went viral, driving conversation and even inspiring outfits for Pride parades.
It created limited-edition cans of Coke containing Fanta, with the label reading ‘This Coke is a Fanta, so what?’ and distributed them to its employees. For Pride, the brand decided to subvert the meaning of local homophobic slur ‘This Coke is a Fanta’, turning it into an empowering statement. Despite being confined to one retailer, the campaign reversed Skittles’ long-term sales decline in the UK.įor Coca-Cola in Brazil, what started as an internal celebration organised by the company’s Diversity Committee, quickly took on a life of its own. The Pride initiative had a halo effect on the core Skittles product’s performance in Tesco, with an increase of 5% in sales volume and of 18% in sales value. That year, Skittles’ presence at Pride extended beyond the parade to point-of-sale, with in-store displays and photo booths driving purchase of the limited-edition packets. Thanks to the buzz generated by the stunt, Skittles was able to partner with supermarket chain Tesco for Pride 2017. Online too, across the brand’s social channels and website, there was no rainbow in sight. On the day, Skittles joined the parade with a black and white float, handing out the limited-edition rainbow-less packets of candy to the crowd. Donating its rainbow and going ‘starkers’ – as they described it – was the brand’s way of paying respect to the event, acknowledging that, for Pride, only one rainbow mattered. Fuelling the celebrationįor the 2016 London Pride, Skittles did what few brands would ever dream of doing: it gave up its most iconic asset – across packaging, product and communications.
#Gay pride rainbow comma how to
More and more businesses are adopting rainbows without doing their homework.”Ĭertain brands have demonstrated how to promote LGBTQ+ rights sincerely by taking part in celebrations, putting unheard voices front and centre and actively promoting acceptance. Asad Dhunna, formerly Director of Communications for London’s Pride, wrote in a 2019 article for Admap: “Without understanding the history and importance of Pride, brands tend to look at Pride as an opportunity for mass engagement. But jumping on the Pride bandwagon without a considered approach can risk ending up with accusations of harmful pinkwashing and appropriation. Pride month is a celebration of equality, diversity and inclusion and is an opportunity for brands to show their support to the LGBTQ+ community. WARC’s Chiara Manco looks at brands that have successfully tapped into Pride month to show support to the LGBTQ+ community.