AdSponge

Starbucks is giving a free tall cup of coffee tomorrow, Election Day, to anyone who votes.

Last week Starbucks got dumped by their main agency of record- Wieden + Kennedy. Today, some details started to come through to unveil reasons behind the split. It seems that Starbucks was such a pain in the ass, WK just said no more.

At first glance, you might think how could you drop a brand like Starbucks? Well, if you look into what is going on recently, it kind of makes sense. Starbucks doesn’t have a large advertising budget, let alone for what they were using WK for ( Starbucks spent 37.6 million in media spending in 2007). Couple that with the struggles Starbucks has been facing, including laying off hundreds of employees and closing some 600 stores. And the topper, as it seems, was the increasing frustration of working with CEO Howard Schultz and his apparent unappreciation for advertising.

The article from Ad Age best sums this whole situation up:

Executives with knowledge of the situation said Starbucks was simply a very frustrating client for Wieden, an agency that other marketers have described as unusually honest in its communication with clients. Other agencies that have worked with Starbucks have felt frustration with the marketer too. Rich Silverstein, co-founder of Omnicom Group’s Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, which did two stints representing Starbucks, said much of the fault lies with the mercurial Mr. Schultz. “He does not appreciate advertising,” he said. “Any agency that comes in has one foot out the door already.”

Will be very intersting to see where Starbuck’s marketing goes from here, and who steps up to become their next agency of record.

Ben Parr of Mashable writes a very exciting post today for those who currently have and hope to find a job in social media, myself included. Ben discusses the current popular status of social media jobs, and his outlook for the near future. Ben writes:

“Even if the title changes, the role of the social media marketer or manager is not going anywhere. Building community, reaching out to potential customers, building stronger relationships, creating buzz – they are fundamental goals to every company. So long as people use social media to share their thoughts and their complaints, the need for people to fill social media jobs will continue to grow.”

This is good news. For one, it validates that social media as a whole is very valuable to marketers, and will figure to be increasingly prevelant as more of us social media junkies get hired and do our trade. Social media should continue to grow despite the weak economy and fact that many companies are slashing marketing spending. Why? Most social media opportunities are free, or very inexpensive. Even hiring just one coordinator to run your blogs and social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook is much more cost effective at establishing relationships with consumers than blowing tens of thousands of dollars on a local cable spot, for example.

Additionally, consumers are much more price sensitive today and look to the internet for price saving information. Social media has the opportunity to inform consumers of sales and discounts via microblogging updates,(see Dell’s Outlet on Twitter) and keep loyal customers involved through blogs and social networking sites. Add the fact that people are staying at home more due to high gas prices, consumers will be spending more time online-which means more face time with your brand.

Note: Parr’s post provides a link to a Jeremiah Owyang post that is an unbelieveable resource of social media professionals and the companies that employ them. Jeremiah also has some pretty good links for job seekers and employers looking to connect; see them here.

I hate writing posts where I slam people for shitty work because ‘What do I know?’ I don’t really have much experience. But sometimes the criticism is warranted. Take for example the many blunders from Yum Brands.

Most recently, they requested 50 Cent to change his name to 79, 89 or 99 Cent for a day to help promote T-Bell’s new value menu. The payoff? A pathetic $10,000 donation to a charity of 50’s choice. Are you kidding me? Anyone with the financial stability of 50 Cent is going to laugh at your offer; they’d rather donate the 10K to charity to have Taco Bell leave them the hell alone.

But this isn’t the first piece of excellent work on Yum’s behalf. Oh no, KFC offered Rihanna and Chris Brown free wings if they showed up at one of their stores.  Wonder what dinosaur thought of that gem. I just can’t believe how that ridiculously prejudicial idea even made it to the editors.

One last beaut, apparently KFC also offered to donate $260,000 to its own educational foundation if an NFL player ‘flapped their wings’ in the end zone during the Super Bowl. Glad to see it takes an act of stupidity by someone else for Yum to donate money to their own foundation.

To Yum’s credit, they did plan one decent promotion of late. During March Madness, if a bottom-seeded team advanced to the Final Four, Pizza Hut would give away free pizza to that campus. Of course, this feat has never been achieved, and likely never will. I don’t love this promotion, but it doesn’t place the brand in a compromising position, and even aligns the brand with underdog teams which I don’t think occurs enough.

I’m all about donating money through creative avenues, and I know you can’t just give all your profits away on a whim, but these acts of stupidity leave me wanting to avoid being associated with their brands.

I pulled the vitals of this post from an article on Ad Age. Give them some love too!

Can’t say I’m surprised by the news that Starbucks is closing 600 stores nationwide. First of all, they were over expanding to the point of cannibalizing other stores, but were OK with it as long as consumers were still drinking Starbucks coffee.

In college, we spent a lot of time reading case studies about Starbucks. They were sort of the ideal company; great growth strategy (we thought), unbelievable brand strength and even admired for being a good employer. Starbucks apparently over-estimated their domestic growth capabilities, and it wound up biting them. We don’t know a lot about the closings yet, but we do know that most of the 600 stores were opened since the beginning of fiscal year 2006. To me, this suggests poor location decisions. Whether opening in new, unproven communities or blanketing existing locations, these stores did not have the customer base to support them and even dragged down other successful locations. The tanking economy doesn’t help either.

Unfortunately, the real loser in all of this is the 12,000 or so employees that will soon be jobless. Starbucks does hope to relocate many of these employees to continuing locations. Lets hope they do!

Overall, I think Starbucks will rebound from their recent struggles. Their ‘return to their roots‘ strategy will pay off in the long run as Starbucks redeems itself as the world’s best coffee experience. I also like their new WiFi agreement with AT&T, as well as the Starbucks iTunes music store. Their brand is strong enough to carry them, and new innovations such as iPhone ordering is just awesome.