Ben & Jerry's brand activism under attack. Somewhere Milton Friedman is laughing because using a brand for anything more than making money is what he was against.
The ouster of Ben & Jerry’s CEO maybe the nail in the coffin for not just purpose marketing…
David Stever, Ben & Jerry’s CEO, was forced out by Unilever brass in continuing disputes over the company’s “political activism.” To say this seems odd would be an understatement. Ben & Jerry’s has always been an activist brand, supporting causes in alignment with the philosophies of its hippy founders.
“What has been disheartening to me in my work is that after all these years, other companies have not figured out how to do what Ben & Jerry’s does. Caring is baked into their DNA from how they source their ingredients to how they communicate on their packaging and online. ”
Brand Activism as Political Commentary
For decades, I have been studying purpose marketing—connecting brands to causes—and Ben & Jerry’s has long been the standard bearer for brand activism. In response to the storming of the US Capitol on January 6th, 2021, the company took this historic moment to be on brand and outspoken. They called for President Trump to be impeached. Period.
In an eight-part Twitter thread (@benandjerrys) dated January 7th the company tweeted, “Yesterday was not a protest—it was a riot to uphold white supremacy.” It went on to write that January 6th was a day that saw “two Americas”: One with “record voter turnout driven by Black voters that resulted in the election of the first Black and first Jewish senators from the state of Georgia—our democracy at its best,” and another with a “mostly white mob, encouraged by the president, violently invade the seat of our democracy in an attempt to overturn a free and fair election.” The thread ended quite simply with: “Resign, impeach, 25th Amendment…not one more day.”
Unique Flavor of Brand Activism
Ben & Jerry’s had the credibility to do this because they have a decades-long history of supporting social and political causes. In 1987, the company created its first “cause-related” flavor called Economic Crunch, which was created in response to the stock market crash. But it was not just about the flavor; B&J showed up on Wall Street to give away free scoops to beleaguered traders.
Subsequent concoctions included One Sweet Whirled, which raised money for environmental causes (2002), and in 2009 the brand changed the name of their wildly popular Chubby Hubby flavor to Hubby Hubby for a month when same-sex marriage became legal in the state of Vermont, the company’s home turf.
Decades in the Baking: Ben & Jerry’s History of Brand Activism
On May 17, 2016—the 62nd anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education—Ben & Jerry’s launched the “Democracy is in your hands” campaign to bring attention to inequalities around voter issues, to provide people with information about fighting for democracy, and to get out to vote. And because it was Ben & Jerry’s, they launched a new flavor to go along with it—Empower Mint.
Also in 2016 the company proclaimed their commitment to support the Black Lives Matter movement in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. Under the headline, We Must Dismantle White Supremacy, and the subhead, Silence is Not an Option, the company not only posted a powerful statement outlining the atrocities of the senseless killing of Black men, women and children, they post made specific recommendations about how to try to alleviate this problem.
Follow the Money to Understand the Latest Brand Activism Backlash
What has seemed to irk the Unilever board more recently are three things: halting sales in the West Bank in 2021, advocating for a ceasefire in Gaza and expressing support for Palestinian refugees, and in a court filing, Ben & Jerry's said Unilever had tried to ban it from publicly criticizing Donald Trump. So, why now?
As always, we have to follow the money. Unilever is a company primarily made up of personal care brands and cleaning products. They are in the food category in only a limited way. The mega conglomerate has been trying to sell off its ice cream business for more than a year. They have stated they want it sold by the end of 2025.
Reining in Ben & Jerry’s politics may facilitate that deal. But it is also sure to piss off consumers. I recently discussed this on the Frugal Friends podcast and the difference between purpose-driven marketing and social impact.
Fight The Good Fight
What has been disheartening to me in my work is that after all these years, other companies have not figured out how to do what Ben & Jerry’s does. Caring is baked into their DNA from how they source their ingredients to how they communicate on their packaging and online.
My hope is that they can fight the good fight and that other companies will study them before it disappears. If not, I fear we will go back to the 1970s when Milton Friedman, Ronald Reagan’s favorite economist, said that the Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits. Period. Nothing would make him happier.
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Click here to watch: Unilever Plans Spin-Off: Ben & Jerry’s CEO Ousted
Ben & Jerry’s has an unusual relationship with their corporate parent. Like other small, purpose- driven companies, they realized the only way they could scale was to become part of a bigger company with better distribution channels. It is a Faustian bargain. Do more overall good by enabling more people to have access to your products or stay small and have complete control over your brand. Ben & Jerry’s was able to do both. When they were purchased by Unilever in 2000, they were a wholly owned subsidiary but they retained their own separate board. In essence, they were a company within a company. In 2012, Ben & Jerry’s became a B Corp, with the blessing of Unilever. This gave the company further protection from corporate governance.
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Click here to listen to the Frugal Friends podcast, where I recently discussed the difference how companies get cause marketing and brand activism wrong.
“When companies connect a brand to a cause it's because some of the other larger institutions in our society don't have the same impact on us in terms of identity creation as they used to; things like our religion, things like our jobs, things like our family...
What happened in the 1990s and into the 2000s is that brands came in to fill that void. So, we're Starbucks or we're Dunkin —those become identifiers for who we are, especially for Millennials and Gen Z.
Brands are part of our identity and what people said to companies was, 'well you better tell me what your values are; if I'm really going to connect with you, you better tell me what your values are.'
So a lot of companies began connecting their products to causes and it could be anything from pink ribbons to green washing to...save the animals...and most of these quite frankly are BS. They don't live up to the values that they present and there's very few that do...”