Mixing Prayer With Poultry and Meat Sales
Tyson Foods Launches Faith-Friendly Marketing Effort
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Tyson Foods has launched a faith-based marketing initiative that is offering consumers free downloadable prayer booklets at the same time the company has placed 128 part-time chaplains in 78 food-processing plants across the country.
So my question is, how many people are they pissing off and turning away? Is it really kosher (note the use of the word) to focus a family-oriented company towards religion and specifically one kind of religion?? Does it feel like a violation of church and state, er... commerce? Or am I the only one a little taken aback by this...
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Tyson Foods has launched a faith-based marketing initiative that is offering consumers free downloadable prayer booklets at the same time the company has placed 128 part-time chaplains in 78 food-processing plants across the country.
So my question is, how many people are they pissing off and turning away? Is it really kosher (note the use of the word) to focus a family-oriented company towards religion and specifically one kind of religion?? Does it feel like a violation of church and state, er... commerce? Or am I the only one a little taken aback by this...
posted by Jess at 7:35 AM
13 Comments:
You're probably not the only one, there are probably a couple of your comrades that feel the same way. This is the same as NASCAR. They pray on live tv before the whole nation every race. Is that a problem as well? I guess not since it is the number one watched sport and an advertisers dream. humm curious? And I don't see tyson having money problems either.
I'm not really personally offended by it, I guess. I don't know many people who would be, but it most certainly will deter non-Christian families from Tyson because they'll fell excluded from the demographic. I just don't see that as the best marketing scheme.
And as for prayers at NASCAR, again, if NASCAR fans cared... it would be brought up. I don't give a damn, because NASCAR is certainly out of my demographic. However, advertisers within NASCAR need to be aware of how they are aligning themselves. It's an image thing.
NASCAR fans are the MOST brand loyal base of any endorsed sport or player: If a fan's favorite NASCAR driver drinks Budweiser, they're a Bud guy for life. I feel that it might be the same thing with religious families, particularly the mother/wife character (who makes 80% of the buying decisions in the family): they are more likely to buy Tyson chicken because the company upholds "good Christian values" like prayer.
It sounds like exploitation to me.
exploitation...Fist off welcome to advertising. Secondly, so is sex in advertising, so is using children. So is running a commercial during a certain show. But because it is cristianity it is an issue? Really? I know you are not going to just on that leftist bandwagon. Secular progressionism.
As for tyson, and not capturing the non-christians families. Considering 80% of america is of the christian faith (a majority mind you..see appicable post on my page), I don't think they really have to worry about it.
Segmenting and targeting your market is not exploitation and you'd do wise not to completely bash my profession on my webspace.
And a man will always have a hard time whining to me about how sex in advertising is exploitation. If penises (or penii) were not so easily manipulated into overtaking the brain and making men's decisions for them, ("rephrased": if sex didn't sell,) we wouldn't use it.
However, you don't see the difference between the use of someone's religion and the use of someone's hormones in commercial advertising??
To some extent yes but not completely. I have seen an orbitz commercial, the one with the quiz show. This one was a little different. It was played during a rerun of will and grace and the stipulations for finding the right hotel where like in san fransisco, [something else], and frienly to homosexuals. Those were the words they used. Is that no exploitation of sexuality?
FYI...Not dogging you about your profession on your blog, but hitting your target audience commercials aimed at products they should be interested in during shows they tend to watch is exploitation. Not in a bad way, and i simply don't believe that tyson is evil for doing the same thing if that is in fact what they are doing. They could be just standing up for family and moral values, something the left in this country doesn't do.
If you don't like it don't buy tyson and get over it.
Ok, another distinction needs to be made: sexual orientation and selling sex are also different. (I wouldn't think I'd have to explain quite so much to someone deemed intelligent -- Intellectual Citizen)
The homosexual community, obviously seeks homosexual atmospheres when traveling. So if this applies to a percentage of the population that watches Will & Grace, they've done well to advertise that this is an important factor in finding a hotel.
You and I will have to agree to disagree on the meaning of the word "exploitation." I feel that it is an inherently negative term and there for "but not in a bad way" doesn't fit for me.
Here's my glitch: When you're using prayer to sell turkey, you're not segmenting based on a mutually exclusive trait. Rephrased (since I know you'll do it anyway), It is not only religious Christian families that buy and eat turkey. Thus, segmenting based on religion is less logical than segmenting based on... say... people who eat turkey?
I am fully aware that selling sexual orientation and selling sex are different. But sexual orientation is something, like religion, that is held ever so closely. I is a core set of values. But thanks for the slam, agree that it was warrented.
Lets play it for a numbers game. What percentage of america eats turkey? I don't know, honestly. But what percentage of america is christian and will it or might start eating turkey. 80%
And I thought a long time ago that we agreed to disagree.
But lets just take the simple answer to the original question that granny apple and I discussed off blog.
"...am I the only one a liitle taken aback by this..."
Yep
The author of this blog would like to make "talking off blog" illegal.
Thank you.
:)
As an obviously religious man, you don't seem to have a problem with the fact that Tyson is in the case, using people's Christian religion to attract them to a product. You think that's perfectly ethical?
And I'm not saying you're "offending" other religions, that would be a little extreme of a reaction (if you're offended by the message, don't choose to buy that brand, etc.), however, they are excluding a few highly regarded religions within the walls of the U.S.
We are not a Christian nation. We are a nation founded on the basis of freedom of religion. I only ask that our media, which you and Intel Cit seem to enjoy bashing so often, be a more accurate reflection of that.
No one is threatened by the minority. It is the majority we must monitor.
See Intel Cit's blog.
The last time a minority "made a ruckus" was when those "uppity black folks" thought they was as smart as we white folks is... and knewed it weren't true!
Change takes motion, action, overaction. I don't regret the decision to desegragate, nor will I ever deny a gay man the right to spend his life with another gay man, with full hospital visitation and insurance coverage rights.
And what made the white man realize that the black man deserved freedom?
The entire civil rights movement, started, continued and upheld by the black man himself.
While I'd love to give credit to us white folk that we just wisened up and learned the error of our previously socially exceptable ways, it was more the attention brought to the issue by the social group it affected.
I have no clue what made you talk about the farmers taking arms against the British, but I will quote you:
"How do we ever know if what we voted on is right or wrong?"
Exactly. You don't ever know. We try our best to behave according what each person on his own believes is right and wrong. We hope that the actions we take are right and that we do right by ourselves, our friends and our beliefs. But we can never be sure because nothing in life is black or white.
Simply summarized, having opinions and beliefs and views is not the same thing to me as having it all figured out and knowing all the answers and knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt what is right and wrong.
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