I ♥ MY Travel CAPPUCCINO

Nobody becomes somebody with a travel mug of the latest coffee blend.
Unaware becomes intellectual. Casual becomes causal chic.

The identity that comes with the coffee has probably been the major success for the coffee chains. It has become a symbol of sophistication, motivation, social competence and wealth.
Some years back Starbucks got criticized for its unethical ways with its suppliers. With the growing importance of CSR, publics started to questions how come a multibillion company like Starbucks didn’t have fair trade coffee available.

Today, Starbucks has improved its brand by becoming Fair trade certified. A fast reaction, made the coffee giant avoid any major damages to its name and the already encoded meanings remained. A consumer holding a travel cappuccino would still feel, and perceived as, a sophisticated motivated person with high social competence. Not a person without morals and good judgement.

Product placement has been crucial to create this identity. In May this year, just after premiere of Sex and the City-The Movie, Vanity Fair published a list over the top sponsors of the production. These brands have ultimately been shown during the course of the series and gained significantly from the popularity the series has generated. Under the sub-heading
“Sips and Snacks” Starbucks is presented first, as it has occurred several times during the production. And those of us that saw " the Devil wears Prada", few missed the re-occuring presence of Starbucks Skinny lattes on Meryl Streep's desk.

Maybe that’s why…so many women got upset over the massive closure of 600 under-performing stores across the US. Some even signed petitions to stop the closure, saying that Starbucks was a “symbol of gentrification”. (Marie Cocco, for The Sacramento Bee)

The Re-branding of China

What are the first words that come in to your mind when someone says China? Nuclear, communism, arts, gymnastics, emperors, spring rolls? Like any other brand, a nation carries an identity. The brand “CHINA” is encoded with different meanings followed by its history, politics and culture.
On 1 October 1949 Mao Zedong proclaimed the founding of the People's Republic of China. It was a time of revolution, upheaval and bloodshed. The events of that period, and the first decades of communist rule which followed, forged the identity of modern China. http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/special_report/1999/09/99/china_50/default.htm

Since Mao, China has been greatly encoded with political meanings. However, with the fast pace of globalization china seems reluctant to wash off the communist stamp. There is a need to encode new meanings into CHINA . It’s no longer favorable to represent communism to attract foreign investment and to appeal to a global market. But much better to show its fast growing economy and trading success overseas. So,in order to finally become number 1 on the global playfield, CHINA has to conform to the rest of the players, in particular to those forming the G8.
One step to conform was its decision to paint over the red flag with the five respectful rings.
The Olympics has been a great opportunity for china to encode new meanings to its brand. Will people buy its new self? With the help of the massive media pressence during the olympics, China gets an oppurtunity to open its borders for the International publics, and therefore also show its new identity. Undoubtly this may change the global view of CHINA to a certain extent,but will the pr- tricks be enough to change it entirely?
Because of people often hold on to old, familiar patterns of thought, creating a new, unified identity that will resonate with publics can be problematic if the old identity is not deconstructed […]”Patricia A. Curtin ,International Public Relations p.173.
Consequently, the only way that China could reallly change its brand, she has to let go of its strings to the past, embrace its new meaning with an open heart and make its people to accept the new identity.

Say it with a picture

Eurostar has taken a daring approach in its divere way of reaching out to its multinational clientele. The rail way company between London-Brussels and Paris, acknowledged soon the need to segment its diverse target groups. To promote its destinations, the Eurostar marketing department, has played greatly on already existing perceptions of the cultures present in these destinations. Simultanously, Eurostar meanings, such as fast travel and convenience,were encoded into the ads.

For the overseas costumers, a more general ad was used to present the destinations. Instead of focusing on only one event or product, the ad presented a panaroma of selected touristic experiences. This way, a target group that were less familiar with, (or sometimes not at all familiar with), the european culture got a wider picture what Euro destinations had to offer. The rail track in the middle encoded the meaning of being able to comfortably bringing costumers between paris and london.

The belgian ads, hoping to promote the Eurostar to london, focused on specific events.


Ads displayed in France used stereotyped messages to get attention.

The circuit of culture (below)

When moving onto a more global perspective on Public Relations, culture sensitivity becomes a major trigger for any campaign to succeed. The notion of PR differs accross borders and so do cultural norms, traditions and regulations.With the rapid move of globalisation PR rarly stays in contact with only one geographical target group. Therefore, PR practise (needs) to be flexible, and can no longer take a systemized western approach to reach out to different publics on a global level.

PR practise around the globe is shaped to fit in into thousands of different cultural settings, struggling to match identities and needs of an uncomptable number of different target groups. Additionally, its practise is significantly shaped (limited) by regulation on both a legal and moral level.

The circuit of culture is a brave attempt to explain the interaction between these variables. In its turn, the ability of interpreting these variables will give the difference between a successful pr-campaign and a total waste of money and effort.

The www: the biggest threat to Nicolas Sarkozy

There was a time when politicians could avoid unpleasant stories to circulate in the media, simply by going to lunches with the leading editors. They could also let their children become best friends with the children of the most important people in Broadcasting and Business. They could go golfing with their rivals on Sunday and send off a bottle of Champagne to their enemies for Christmas.
Not to forget the time when the president held monopoly over the press, and hence had total control over the information flow.
Those days are gone…
Mr Sarkozy sits by his desk and flips through the "History of the Press". He looks at his forerunners and how the censures always help them in crisis. But that does not work anymore. Because, just like himself, the newspapers are getting less and less popular. On Edelman’s blog, he writes about his meeting with three senior journalists from the Wall Street Journal. They all appear very doubtful about the future of print media, as the www is becomng a greater threat. And although bloggers often link back to newspapers, these serve a lot of time only to reference information that you already knew.
The circulation has dropped significantly for daily news papers on a global level. As a consequence to free newspapers and online news, people do not really see the point anymore to buy Print media. Daily News papers in the EU have seen a 5.63 drop since 2002. Evolution of technology, forces print media to the cliff.

The consequences?

People access their news online and the information flow gets faster and less controllable. Reputation management for politicians like Nicolas Sarkozy will be fairly challenging. Through wikis and blogs, anyone with something to say can publish it within a few seconds.
Therefore, close ties with the news media will not help Nicolas Sarkozy. In a network that comprises 100 millions of blogs, there will take more than champagne bottles to avoid unpleasant news circulating on the web.

The eye of Nicolas

One of the problems that PR has experienced over the recent years, is that information is getting less and less controllable. While Social networks and blogging can be powerful tools to spread a message they also become a threat. In an Information society that’s working both ways, PR people are challenged to get rid of harmful information on the Web. For example, Nicolas Sarkozy’s drunken speech at the G8 press conference wasn’t broadcasted, but still 2 million people manage to see the clip on Youtube.
For this reason, the Elysee has hired Nicolas Princen, to keep an eye on everything and anything happening in the social networks and blogs. He is intended to detect any harmful messages that circulate about the President on the web, and then alarm it back to the Parliament.
The new recruit also has a page on facebook, like many other politicians today. Consequently, this gives a good opportunity to interact directly with voters and conduct a discrete PR-campaign via chats and messages. Not only will it enable promotion for the UMP, but also get a greeter insight of the public opinion about Nicolas Sarkozy and if there is any damaging material published in the social network.
It will not be possible to suppress any messages that circulate on the web; but it will be a way to prepare any possible crisis for the media. Spokesmen get some hours more to practice their speech to save the situation. A speech that may be a little less shaky, a little more credible.

Bad --> Good

Image from Charlie Hebdo

The main mission for people working with Public Relations is to alter negative or neutral attitudes into positive.
"Clients not satisfied" need to become "Clients satisfied". "Sad" turns "happy" and "unaware" becomes "aware".

In the French government In-house PR department, devoted people work assumable around the clock to turn Chaos into Normal.
Here follows some sub-missions to enable such a project


Sarkozy”the unreliable"--> Sarkozy”the implacable"

According to a recent poll, 67 % of the French say "mostly not satisfying" to Sarkozy's first year as president. 59 % think that the year has been a downfall for French. Only 20 % of them were positive to the Sarko's first year of reign. What trick will you poll now Carla?



Chinese boycott of French companies --> Carrefour’s own brand filling up Chinese cupboards.

Internet users strike back on the French protests when the Olympic fire was to be lit in Paris. Some Chinese feel offended by France stand point in the Olympic- matter, and want to take revenge by boycotting French companies. For Carrefour, one of the main targets for the boycott, the near future is looking very unsure. Carrefour is one of the most popular super markets in China, and losing market value would mean a significant loss for the giant. Other companies threatened are Louis Vuitton, Dior and Peugeot.



Discontent among workers ----> people enjoying working in unfair conditions for unfair salary.

Discontent among worker seems to have been a general trend throughout the first year of Nicolas Sarkozy’s regime.
Now, the Minister of national education, Xavier Darcos, suggests a reform to limit the national number of teachers. So once again teachers and students dusted off their revolution flags, grabbed some flyers and formed with the syndicate a powerful strike against the reforms.

The other group to strike is the “sans-papier”, without papers. These are individuals that have worked for France for a longer time but never gotten a legal security from the French government. These are also individuals that have been paying taxes, and that are getting tired of give give give, and never get anything in return.

As Nicolas Sarkozy and Xavier Darcos probably will have a hard time to get people used to the unfair conditions, they need to look for other solutions.