Ben & Jerry’s: the hippie ice cream brand owned by Unilever that came from humble origins founded by Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield that grew to be a business with sales over $936 million.

Before writing this, they weren’t a brand I knew a great deal about but the more I researched them, the more I learned that they are far from your ordinary business and have some interesting marketing and promotional activities that make them the brand they are today.

Advertising

As with many multinational enterprises, Ben & Jerry’s do a notable amount of TV advertising to promote their business as they are in the fortunate position of being able to afford this expensive form of promotion.

To be honest, their advertising doesn’t excite me in the way that some others do. It is mostly adverts showing off their products in a cute cartoonish way with some images of the ingredients: perfectly satisfactory and I’m sure it makes people buy the product but it isn’t exactly memorable or exciting. Good job that the other elements of their marketing are more interesting.

Sales Promotion

From this point on, things get a lot more interesting as Ben & Jerry’s have some interesting ways of getting their message across. One of which is the sales promotion strategy of ‘Free Cone Day’.

First held in 1979, Free Cone Day was the founders’ way of thanking their customers for helping them to get through their first year – and they have continued the tradition ever since meaning they can get free cones (yes, multiple) for free on this one day of the year.

This must be ridiculously expensive for the brand although the free social media exposure may make it worth and as with most things Ben & Jerry’s it does have altruistic roots.

Public Relations

For me, Ben & Jerry’s public relations and the brand image they create is fascinating. How many multinational companies can you name with an activism department? Not many I’d imagine but Ben & Jerry’s is one of them.

From its inception, Ben & Jerry’s has stood for social activism as the founders held profit and people on equal footing deciding that with the founders’ new fame as businesspeople they could be a force for positive change.

A recent example of this is their ‘Save Our Swirled’ limited edition ice cream that championed the campaign against climate change.

The vegan dairy-free ice cream promoted the idea that climate change is an issue we need to take action on while also linking to the 2015 Paris Climate Summit.

You may think that this is another brand ‘greenwashing’ and trying to use social causes for marketing purposes but Ben & Jerry’s beg to differ. Their director of PR, Sean Greenwood, said “The concept is not for us to do something controversial for attention. These actions do not fall under marketing as an advertising spend”.

They are certainly a fascinating brand that have promoted themselves and their products in such a way that no other business of their scale has nor that others could replicate.

Do comment your thoughts below.