After coming across Kamil Kulewski’s blog post about how Moschino’s  pill themed fashion line has caused an outrage, I was quite astounded to see how a well known brand could undervalue a topic like prescription drug and glamorise it in the name of fashion.

However, Moschino is not the only brand that has touched such a sensitive topic that has led to offending quite a number of people. Amongst a plethora of brands, ‘Urban Outfitters’ stands tall. It has made countless number of headlines for all the wrong reasons.

Over the years, UO has offended Hindus, Jewish, Eating-disorder awareness groups, native groups etc. As a Hindu, I was personally offended when UO came out with a line of Lord Ganesha depicted on socks. In Hindu culture, the feet are perceived to be one of the most impure part of the body, and to have a holy figure around it was disheartening.
Other controversies include:

– A faux bloodstained Kent State Sweatshirt that widely depicted the 1970 Kent State massacre

-Tapestries that had grey and white stripes with pink triangles that clearly recalled the clothing Nazis forced gay prisoners to wear.

– The most recent controversy as of April 2016 was when UO came out with a shampoo for “suicidal hair”.

Since 2003, more than 18 controversies have been discussed in the media. It’s quite interesting to see that every time UO   ‘accidentally’ offend a certain ethnicity, race, religion or an awareness group and after it goes viral in the media, they immediately discontinue the products.

If these mistakes only happened a couple of times, just like what happened to Moschino,  I would certainly agree with Kamil that it can be avoided with a better marketing team that put more effort on market research.

However, it seems like these moves are intentional and are helping UO with gaining more brand awareness. With the controversies going Viral on social media amongst teenagers, It effectively leads to word of mouth marketing strategy. Sitting in Asia, where there are  no Urban Outfitters store, I already knew about the brand and so did my peers. As of today UO has a large following on Social Media.

We can clearly see that Urban Outfitters have adopted Guerrilla marketing strategy to its advantage. This is an unconventional strategy where consumers are taken aback and are left with an impression in their mind. UO is quite smart in the sense that they don’t overuse this strategy as it may evoke a range of strong negative emotions that will affect sales of the company but do it just enough to create a hype in the media and apologise with authentic reasons when they get caught so that their consumer base doesn’t decrease rapidly.

 

 

 

Resources: 

• @TheWeek. “15 Urban Outfitters Controversies.” 15 Urban Outfitters Controversies. N.p., 29 Apr. 2016. Web. 16 Oct. 2016. <http://theweek.com/articles/480961/15-urban-outfitters-controversies>.
• Beusman, Callie. “Urban Outfitters, Ever Insensitive, Pulls Offensive Ganesh Socks.” Jezebel. N.p., 17 Dec. 2013. Web. 16 Oct. 2016. <http://jezebel.com/urban-outfitters-ever-insensitive-pulls-offensive-gan-1484982837>.
• @nbcbayarea. “Urban Outfitters’ Controversy a “Mistake” or Marketing Ploy?” NBC Bay Area. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Oct. 2016. <http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Reality-Check-Latest-Urban-Outfitters-Controversy-a-Mistake-or-Marketing-Ploy-275399781.html>.
• “Urban Outfitters Offends on Purpose … and the Strategy Is Actually Working, Say Experts.” N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Oct. 2016. <http://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2014/09/16/urban-outfitters-offends-on-purpose.html>.
• “Kamil Kulewski’s Blog – Just Another UBC Blogs Site.” Kamil Kulewskis Blog. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Oct. 2016. <https://blogs.ubc.ca/kamilkulewski/>.