October marks Breast Cancer Awareness month, and any visit to your local mall, Shoppers Drug Mart, or even KFC will remind you of such; pink ribbons plastered everywhere, encouraging you to buy more for a cure. A recent article from the Globe and Mail called The Pink Ribbon Backlash, explored this phenomenon and the emergence of “pink-washing”.
As a sustainability marketing class, we are all familiar with “green washing”. Wikipedia described it as “the deceptive use of green PR or green marketing in order to promote a misleading perception that a company’s policies or products (such as goods or services) are environmentally friendly”. Pink-washing works along the same lines, misleading customers to believe that purchasing these products will lead to a cure for breast cancer. While I’m sure that the $0.50 that KFC donates from each bucket of fried chicken sold will eventually fund some research somewhere, is it enough to counter the damage done to the consumer? Recent studies have shown that a high fat diet increases the risk of breast cancer. Perhaps everyone would benefit more from laying off the Double-Downs, than from half-a-dollar worth of research.
The biggest point to take away from this is that customers need to apply objective thought when purchasing products. Don’t assume that every benefit claimed from a product is truly beneficial. Breast Cancer awareness is important, I agree, but companies trying to make a quick buck off the movement is not the only way to find a cure.
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