Is this "You Retard" cap a simple case of awkward bilingualism?

If so, it's a very Canadian problem — and one that other brands would do well to learn from.

Global News reports that an Edmonton woman was shocked to see these words on the bottom of a cap she had just removed from a bottle of glacéau vitaminwater (a Coca-Cola product).

The woman, 32-year-old Blake Loates, says she was particularly outraged because her younger sister she has a younger sister lives with cerebral palsy and autism.

“We started wondering if it was a disgruntled employee who did that. And then, how did it get out of Coke’s factory?" she told reporters. "We were just really confused.”

Ms. Loates contacted her father in Tacoma, Washington. He immediately wrote an impassioned demand to Coca-Cola for the brand to apologize:

Imagine my surprise when I got this photo from my oldest daughter, Blake, who lives in Edmonton, Alberta in Canada. You see, the “R” word is considered a swear word in out family. We don’t use it. We don’t tolerate others using it around us. We ARE over-sensitive but you would be too if you had Fiona for a daughter! 

I know you will likely blame this on some rogue employee at some distant bottling plant. Probably not even one of your employees. But you have invested billions in promoting your brand. (Heck, I’ve been drinking Coke products since I was nine and got my first paper route!) And this single action, this small word printed on the bottom of a Vitamin Water lid, discovered by my daughter in Canada, has inspired me to tell you just how much the “R” word hurts. How destructive it is. How caustic. How uninformed. How isolating. Like the “N” word.

Ms. Loates also shared the letter on Facebook, along with a picture of the cap and of her sister.

Coca-Cola did apologize, in an e-mail. But they also issued a statement claiming that the words were part of a promotion.

From Global:

“We started printing random English and French words under the caps of glacéau vitaminwater. The top word English, bottom word French. In this case, a French word, despite an innocent meaning in French, made the production list of words,” Shannon Denny, director of Brand Communications with Coca-Cola Canada, said in a written statement Wednesday. 

We sincerely apologize for having inadvertently offending anyone. We take every consumer concern very seriously. This is a genuine oversight in the review process. The mistake has been corrected and the words removed from all future production. 

We recognize now this word should be removed due to the English connotations and have taken immediate action to thoroughly investigate this matter. Again, this was a genuine oversight in the review process.”

As corporate apologies go, it's not bad. HuffPo says Coca-Cola  plans to suspend the promotion and will recall product to ensure all remaining "worded" caps have been destroyed.

However, a nice little donation to R-Word.org would have added more weight to it. After all, even an accidental mistake is an opportunity to show what you're made of.

(Thanks to Audra Williams for the tip.)

Nova Scotia consent ads take heat for blunt sexual language

Via CBC

A campaign about consent by the government of Nova Scotia has provoked mixed reactions from the very groups it hopes to champion, in the post-Rehtaeh conversation about consent and rape culture.

According to the CBC, Sherri Bain, an advocate for survivors of assault, questioned the approach:

"Their design team, I think, missed the mark,” she said. She worries the message could be misinterpreted. 

"For someone driving by, if they're seeing 'take me' and 'do me,' I'm concerned that it may do exactly the opposite of what they're intending," she said. "Our city needs to find another way to advertise besides being so overtly sexual."

A later article adds:

...since the ads have gone up, some young women and groups that work with victims of sexual violence have complained in media reports that they don't explain clearly enough that consent from someone who has been drinking or taking drugs does not qualify as true consent for sex.

Via Global

Global News also posted this shot of the call-to-action from the posters:

The campaign site, novascotia.ca/ask, positions information about drugs and alcohol very prominently.

The ads were created by Communications Nova Scotia (the Chronicle-Herald says Stir Creative) following focus group research with male and female youth. While one woman participant has come forward to say she was assured the ads would never run, the findings from the male groups convinced Marilyn More, Nova Scotia's minister of labour and advanced education, to stand by the campaign:

"They told us this is the kind of campaign they would respond to, [that] it made a difference in how they thought about consent for sexual activity," she said. 

"Quite frankly, I don't think there is a perfect ad campaign that means the same to everyone in this province but we had to start somewhere."

Personally, I'm not in love with the art direction of these ads. But the fact that they have people in national mainstream media talking about the complexities of sexual consent is a "win" as far as social marketing goes. I only wish the province had released the posters in full, so those media wouldn't have to run smartphone shots of the creative.

Trust in Advertising

Nielsen's Global Online ‘Trust in Advertising’ study shows that consumer trust in admen is down, and faith in word-of-mouth is still on top:



Compare this to the same survey results from two years ago:




Bad news for strictly traditional advertising, great opportunity for plans that successfully integrate buzz and social media.

Branded corporate communications, however, also made considerable gains. But it's interesting to break this down regionally and compare it to how authoritarian you believe each of these cultures to be:

Brand websites, globally the most trusted form of advertiser-led advertising, hold the greatest sway in China (82 percent). Following China are Pakistan (81 percent) and Vietnam (80 percent). However, brand websites tend to be trusted least amongst Swedish (40 percent) and Israeli (45 percent) Internet consumers. In the US, 62 percent of Internet consumers said they trusted brand sponsorships, placing the United States 21st out of the 50 countries surveyed.

While brands hold great sway in China, it's interesting to note that yesterday the BBC reported a Chinese internet survey showing that prostitution is now considered to be the third most trustworthy "profession", placing sex workers behind only farmers and the clergy.

Admen were not mentioned.