PODCAST TRANSCRIPT:

Michael Graham [00:00:00] Welcome to Marketing Murder Mystery. I’m your host Michael Graham. Advertising marketing pros see it all the time. Brands getting killed in the marketplace, sometimes due to their own miscalculations but sometimes by events beyond their control.

[00:00:14] Every week on this podcast, we’re going to review some of these cases. Some of the classics like New Coke, others that are ripped from today’s headlines for lessons that marketing executive and communication strategists can learn today to help avoid becoming the next victim.

[00:00:31] Who killed Juul’s brand? The crime scene is nationwide a coast to coast debate. Even a marketing scandal if you will. The story of a white-hot brand that now teeters on the brink of a meltdown. We’re talking about Juul the world’s largest e-cigarette manufacturer.

[00:00:47] We are the marketing detectives and you are the jury. You’ll hear the evidence and hand down the verdict. Did Jewel murder its brand?

[00:01:13] First though, a bit about the company that is charged with murdering its own brand. Juul is on track to make more than three billion dollars this year, triple what they made last year. At the same time, hundreds of people have fallen ill and there have been deaths linked to the e-cigarette industry in which Juul is a premium, in fact, you can say the premium product. So, in January 2019, Juul announced a 10 million dollar advertising campaign for cable, TV, and radio that targets current adult smokers trying to rebrand itself as a device focused on getting people currently using traditional or combustible cigarettes to switch over to something that has less risk and less harm. Instead, opponents say no. You’ve been marketing your product in a way that draws in people who are nonsmokers, particularly young people getting them involved in the nicotine cycle of commerce.

[00:02:10] That is the accusation against Juul and that is the accusation that is allegedly hurting its brand. According to ad measurement company, iSpot, Juul has spent more than 29 million dollars on eighty-seven hundred airings of TV spots in the U.S. since January 8th with this new smoking mitigation message. The ad also appeared in full-page print and it said the average smoker tries to quit over 30 times, make the switch. Let’s listen to this new marketing approach from Juul in an ad called Pat.

Juul Advertisement [00:02:41] This is my mom’s house. This place is home. A lot of first happened here. First kiss. First cigarette. Never saw it as a problem. When I was younger, two cigarettes, three cigarettes. It wasn’t, it wasn’t a habit. My mom, she was always like, “you to do something. You need to get rid of them.” That was her thing. As time went on and smoking started falling out of fashion in society and rules started changing. Gave the Juul a real chance and found that I liked it. I found that it really works. The switch was easy. It was a no brainer really. But now that I look at people who smoke I’m like, “Dude, really?” Still doing that? There’s an alternative to that, right? You don’t have to do that. The person that I’d like to think that I am is because of her. This came from her, really.

Michael Graham [00:03:36] Unfortunately for Juul, the controversy continues. The pressure on them is increasing, particularly related this issue of how are you presenting your product. Are you targeting young people? And so now, Juul has announced it has suspended all TV print digital ads. It will also stop some of its lobbying efforts, and the company is saying it is committing to fully support and comply with any new federal policy related to vaping products. The U.S. Food Drug Administration is weighing regulations to ban all flavored cigarettes which some consider particularly attractive to young users. New Hampshire became one of the first states to prohibit the sale of e-cigarettes to minors under 18. Breathe New Hampshire helped pass that law in 2010. Since then they’ve been working to educate young people about the dangers of vaping. They created a presentation called vaping unveiled, which has been seen by thousands of educators and students across the Granite State. Joining me now to talk about Juul’s marketing practices is Dr. Albee Budnitz from Breathe New Hampshire. Doctor Budnitz, welcome.

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:04:31] Thank you very much. Glad to be here.

Michael Graham [00:04:33] So, how significant is it that we have apparently reached the Kleenex, jello stage for vaping in Juul. Kids don’t say, “let’s vape.” Or, “I’m vaping.” They say, “let’s Juul,” right?

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:04:48] Correct. And a year ago even the engaged kids, say at Nashua High North and South did not realize that Juuling was the same thing as vaping. My feeling is that Juuling just took a chapter right out of Big Tobacco’s playbook having been around long enough to see how Big Tobacco advertised and marketed their product. Juuling did the exact same thing. They actually were a little smarter, in that the two folks who invented Juuling from Stanford, grad students, included besides their marketing techniques that the big tobacco use. They also use social media and otherwise took their playbook directly from them.

Michael Graham [00:05:29] So what’s the playbook? Tell me about the marketing decisions that Juul has made that mirror the decisions that you believe Big Tobacco made back in the day.

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:05:38] They advertised initially about health claims, taking advantage of adolescent psychology, for looking for freedom and macho-ness in boys, and liberty and looking good and health claims in girls and for in popularity for both of them. Now they added cool tech and flavors to get kids hooked and then they have a customer for life. The reason why they have to go after kids is that the brain of the last organ to develop the brain is very susceptible to, unbelievably susceptible to drugs. And that’s what happened with Juul.

Michael Graham [00:06:15] So when you mention marketing back like Big Tobacco once did, what are some examples that you can kind of compare today versus the bad old days.

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:06:23] Big tobacco used a theme of freedom, Juuls did the exact same thing. E-cigarettes do the exact same thing, and you can look at ads from the 40s, 50s, and 60s or the 50s, 60s, and 70s, really. And they look exactly the same. They have health claims, and youth, and excitement. They didn’t even change the framing of the advertising. So, if you look at an ad from Kool in the 90s, and you’ll look at it Juul ad from now, they have a young woman with a hairstyle and a cock of her head. It’s exactly the same as the one from the 90’s.

Michael Graham [00:06:56] What about Joe Camel? Is there a Joe Camel?

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:06:58] There isn’t a cartoon character yet.

Michael Graham [00:07:00] Well, when you look at the color, I mean the flavoring marketing for example. You can definitely see that it seems to be going after a less mature market.

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:07:09] The names are all sweet and aimed at kids. They’re even advertising vapes back to school as one of the things to use. That marketing is continuing.

Michael Graham [00:07:18] So, Dr. Budnitz, you’re a health professional, not necessarily a marketing professional but you’ve done this great presentation. You clearly looked at it. So I’d like to know your opinion about this. You know, the answer from people in the e-cigarette industry is, “of course we market based on attractiveness, and freedom, and self-empowerment that’s how you sell everything. Cars, clothes, eyeglasses. Aren’t you really just objecting to the fact that they’re marketing a product you don’t like and that there’s nothing uniquely troublesome about the marketing itself?”

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:07:46] Tobacco companies marketed their products as a health product, making someone look youthful, looking macho, looking like they’re successful. If used as intended, it’s going to kill half of its users prematurely. When you’re 40, 50, or 60, like really old. To a 15 or 16-year-old, that’s really old.

Michael Graham [00:08:04] So, the companies are going to market as they can market. They’re going to do what they can do. What about the role of parents? Should parents play a role in controlling the media that their children access to or their children? What’s the role of parents here?

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:08:18] Before they talk to their kids they need to be educated on what e-cigarettes do and the harm they will bring to the kid’s brain. And once they have the knowledge to change behavior, we move into changing the environment. So, they can change the environment they know e-cigarettes in this environment.

Michael Graham [00:08:33] You mentioned earlier that you’ll use social media. That’s relatively new for marketing. They didn’t have social media obviously back in the heyday of combustible cigarettes et cetera. Looked at from a marketing in the most basic sense of I’m trying to get you to do something, what role can like, peers, friends. You know, the people in your social world, not the paid ads and the promoted ads, but like your friends on Instagram on Facebook if you’re a kid. If they’re saying. “Hey, stay away from this stuff.” Because is that powerful marketing too?

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:09:02] I would hope that you could counter market the marketing that’s already been on the social media to start using these products, and they’re beginning to do that. There’s a group called Get Outraged, producing PSA’s and putting them on social media to say. “Hey, you’re really being stupid doing this. It’s affecting your brain. And these companies are just duping you into becoming their customers so they can make money.” And Juul has made a lot of money. Juul, which was not on the market at the beginning of 2015, between the 2015 end of 2018 became a 38 billion dollar business.

Michael Graham [00:09:34] It’s astonishing story, we appreciate you sharing it with us here on the podcast. Dr. Albee Budnitz from Breathe New Hampshire. Thanks for your time.

Dr. Albee Budnitz [00:09:41] Thank you very much.

Michael Graham [00:09:48] Here to help us conduct the investigation, Linda Fanaras and Rob Atkinson with Millennium Agency. So, Linda, Robb. Fascinating information from Dr. Budnitz at Breathe New Hampshire. And I got to say, he makes the case that marketing nicotine to kids is nothing new. Is he right?

Linda Fanaras [00:10:06] Michael, that is absolutely right. I mean, let’s just take a look back at the camel, and the garb that went with that, and the advertising that went along with that. The sale of sunglasses, all sort of position toward kids, and we look at the time period of that from, eighty-nine to ninety-three, thirty years ago. I mean, the share among kids increased more than 50 percent, but that adult market didn’t change at all. Sales of the adult market of cigarettes did not change at all during that time period. So, you’re absolutely right. I mean, there’s nothing new that we have today regarding marketing nicotine to kids. There are two words I have to say regarding this deja vu and profits. I mean, today we have Juul that’s tracking at about a billion in sales, that’s about up 300 percent. Not only that, those co-founders are worth about seven hundred and thirty million dollars apiece.

Robb Atkinson [00:10:58] And remember Altria, which owns 33 percent of Juul, formerly was called Philip Morris. And Philip Morris is one of the original founders of how to advertise tobacco to kids and adults, let’s be honest. And you know, in fact, they were so good, you bring up Joe Camel. They were so good at that, I wanted to do some research on it and I found it ABC news stories from 1997, and I want to play a little bit of that for you right now.

ABC News Report [00:11:27] At their headquarters in North Carolina today, the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company announced that they are dropping the popular Joe Camel ad campaign. It was one of the most successful cigarette ad campaigns ever devised, so successful in fact, that it infuriated many anti-smoking advocates. Aaron Brown tonight on Joe Campbell’s last ride. In retirement, Joe Camel deserves more than a gold watch. He saved a dying brand, ten years ago Camel was an old man’s cigarette. Joe made camels hip. It was very counterculture, it appealed to people who didn’t like the establishment, that say a factor or an image that appeals very much to people who are younger and it works very well. Kids love Joe. Researchers in 1991 found more kids knew Joe Camel than knew Mickey Mouse. Before that Joe Camel campaign, only 3 percent of under 18 smokers smoked camels. In just six years, that grew to 13 percent which is exactly why anti-smoking groups hated the campaign so much.

Robb Atkinson [00:12:34] More kids knew Joe Camel than Mickey Mouse! That’s incredible. I mean think about that. Juul is using cartoons on their packaging to attract kids with flavors like whipped cream, juice box, vanilla wafer, and Michael here’s my favorite, Oreo.

Michael Graham [00:12:49] By the way, the Oreo doesn’t taste that much like Oreo, just so you know.

Robb Atkinson [00:12:51] But you know. They, they know what they’re doing and it’s important to remember that this is a dangerous compound, and I’m not preaching here but I was talking to Dr. Budnitz earlier and he told me that a half a teaspoon of the liquid in the vaping cartridges is enough to kill a small dog or a small child, if they were to take that. So you know, this is powerful prescription medicine that people are using, and, and the techniques that they’re doing it to get them to use it constantly is really, you know from a marketing point of view, it’s ingenious, but I’m not sure I endorse it.

Michael Graham [00:13:30] Sure. There are two elements here. One is, you know, what are you selling and the answer that the companies in these industries have is. “Well, I’m selling a legal product. As long as it’s legal, you can’t get mad at me.” The other part is the effectiveness of their marketing, and you know, based on what you present it is pretty clear that their marketing is effective. The question is, and I found this fascinating you’ve all mentioned it. How is the marketing of vaping today learning the lessons of marketing to young people in the past? And how clear is an example?

Robb Atkinson [00:14:03] Well, it’s, it’s unbelievable. So, here’s a Philip Morris ad from 1941, and it declares, “freedom from throat irritation.” And now fast forward to today, Michael. Blue had an ad in 2013 that basically says, “Take back your freedom.” It’s a similar style ad, with similar style imagery, and it’s really just taking the most successful ads of the past and applying it today. And it doesn’t stop at that. I mean, check out this one where they’re trying to show how macho people were then, where the Cowboy’s smoking a cigarette, but fast forward to today. It’s a new age cowboy in the exact same pose, showcasing the cigarettes. It’s incredible.

Michael Graham [00:14:44] Well, the good news is it’s impossible to look macho when those big glass e-cig things in your face. You look the opposite of macho, but that’s what the marketing is trying to do.

Robb Atkinson [00:14:54] Yeah. And to Linda’s point about deja vu all over again. There was a famous ad that said. “More doctors smoke camels than any other cigarettes.” Well, they recently came out with a vaping ad in the same vein, and it says. “More doctors vape, than use traditional cigarettes.” I mean, it’s exactly the same and the ad, the vape ad, looks like a doctor from 1950.

Michael Graham [00:15:18] And so, what I take away from listening to you talk about this is that the techniques of marketing work. The appeal to authority for example, which is the. the doctor ad works. The associating a product that has, let’s face it, and no direct impact on your image. You know, you’re still the same tall, short, fat, thin, whatever. But I’ve got, whether it’s the cigarette and the Marlboro Man, or whether it’s the vape device and the tough-looking, you know, the cool-looking guy today. All these marketing tools work. In my experience, working with people who are doing marketing et cetera, is that there’s always a desire to reinvent the wheel, and we’re going to start, we’re gonna do something, and I’m going. “I don’t know.” That, pretty much people buy things for the same motivations, don’t they?

Linda Fanaras [00:16:07] You’re absolutely right. It’s that that emotional factor that really draws somebody to make a buying decision. And honestly, I mean when it comes to kids and Juul for example, I mean they were technically you know trying to, I’m assuming, try to obviously have an uptick in the adult market. But the fact of the matter is, is the kids market went crazy and it was marketing materials. They had launched a big campaign called vaporize, where you see this young girl who’s acting like she’s dancing to some club music, which has this sort of sexy look and feel, and it’s making her feel like she’s important. And all of those were pushed through some pretty powerful mediums. I mean, we’re talking social media channels and we know how well those work with kids, email marketing, websites, and so on and so forth. I mean, it’s just absolutely incredible.

Michael Graham [00:17:03] The other part about this. In this case, you have a product that there are now a lot of controversies about health effects, even though it’s been on the market for three or four years. But now you’re in this moment of crisis, so people say. “Well look at these boxes. It’s got pictures of characters off the side of a cereal box. It’s got you know flavors and you know, it looks like it’s marketing to kids, but then you look at the behavior of young adults, 18 to 25. There’s a juvenilization of that segment of the market, and I think you see all kinds of products are going to have trouble with this. Whether it’s vaping, or whether it’s alcohol, which of course legal at 21, but if 21-year-olds are acting like 14-year-olds. You see what I’m saying, your product is trying to go after young adults, you’re going to be in some interestingly interesting messaging territory.

Robb Atkinson [00:17:50] But they do it because they have to. They have to survive. The youth today that that gets vaping is the person who converts to smoking in a few years. So it’s really in their interest to capture them early and social media is a great way to do it, right? I mean, we all consume vast amounts of social media and to Linda’s point about, you know, using attractive models, showcasing lifestyles. And the other thing about what’s interesting about Juul is it’s not just social media, but they’ve built the whole kit around. Right? So not only do they have this cool vaping pen, but they also have a backpack, a hat, merch, you know. So it goes it completes the whole image of someone who’s vaping can have this whole new look and a whole new social status.

Michael Graham [00:18:34] But that someone who’s vaping could be 19. The marketing materials I’m looking at would look like the kind of content that I see 19, 20, 21, 22-year-old adults looking at.

Linda Fanaras [00:18:45] Unless you’re very direct on the fact that you do not want to market to anyone under the age of 21. I would absolutely say that that cross-market segmentation is a very fine line.

Michael Graham [00:18:55] I guess what I would say is that Juul, I think has a case to be made that their goal was not to reach underage smokers, but rather to reach smokers right, you know, on their 18th birthday. But at the same time, you can’t argue as you were pointing out Rob, is the result.

Robb Atkinson [00:19:11] You know so Juul, the other thing that they did was they went out and they hired a lot of social media influencers, right? So who’s a social media influencer in the community? It’s probably a big brother, older brother, older sister that goes to college. So freshmen come back from college, they bring this merch, they bring this new thing, and then they showcase it. You know, Dr. Budnitz has shared some data with me also that has shown that seven percent of seventh-graders in New Hampshire have tried vaping. I mean, that’s incredible when you think about it. I mean, the market penetration is going deeper, and deeper, and deeper because of these flavored alternatives to smoking.

Michael Graham [00:19:47] One of the reasons why this has gotten so much attention is not just the health issue, although that is the front page, but the second page is the, “there is a ton of money here.” If you’re in a community that doesn’t smoke at all. If you don’t hang out with younger people, you don’t realize how much vaping is going on. How big is the e-cigarettes market now?

Linda Fanaras [00:20:05] Juul in the first half of 2019, actually spent 104 million dollars. That is absolutely incredible the amount of money that they spend, and this market is growing unbelievably. I mean, if we look back at like 2014, for example, this market was estimated at. 2.5 billion, and they’re expecting by 2025 that it’s going to be a forty-seven billion-dollar market. That is, the growth of that is just unbelievable as far as I’m concerned. We know that now Juul has halted a lot of this stuff. But frankly, a lot of it is already penetrated through the markets.

Michael Graham [00:20:43] And that raises a good point because there’s been this pressure to stop e-cigarette advertising, particularly anything that at all could be related to reaching out to kids, or appears to be marketing to younger people. Has this pressure resulted in less marketing, less social media interaction, et cetera?

Robb Atkinson [00:20:57] Yeah, it’s interesting. So, we said at the beginning of this that Juul has halted some of its lobbying efforts. A new report out today, basically says that Juul, yes has stopped lobbying for flavored tobacco to be sold because they’re taking flak for kids using it. But what they’ve done is they switch to a grassroots campaign and this new report says that marketers at Juul labs started recruiting customers painstakingly calling them and emailing one by one to have them come forward with their story about how they made the switch from smoking, to vaping and they’re better off on it. And that pressure is now being applied to their local officials, and Congress, whoever listens to them and they’re signing petitions.

Michael Graham [00:21:42] In which, once again, it shows the power of marketing because they have this story to tell and like other products it can be used responsibly, it can be used irresponsibly. So you get a phone call today from Juul Linda, and they say. “What do we do? Millennium Agency, help!” What’s your answer.

Linda Fanaras [00:22:02] You know, one of the things that they did do, whether this will come back or not. There was a professor that did a study through Stanford research and looked back and realized from like 2015, they had deleted like 2500 tweets, 400 Facebook and Instagram posts, information on their Web sites and on some of their email marketing campaigns which they technically cannot be directly marketing to these kids. So that to me, I think is it will be a concern in the long run, especially from the PR side. But this is definitely the point any business should really take a pause. Really, it’s a pivotal point in their decision-making process and they must absolutely make the right decision because it will impact government and it’s going to impact the consumers. And we know when it comes to kids’ health and well-being, it’s a really, really sensitive subject. From a business cooperation perspective, obviously, they’re going to be weighing the risks involved here. The profits involved, what they’ve done, what they should be doing, and so on and so forth. But actually building out a set of key talking points and using that as the foundation, taking a 30 day grace period, and really coming up with a strategy that will benefit them in the long run.

Robb Atkinson [00:23:15] Yes absolutely. So you want to get in front of this. You don’t want Congress saying you can’t do it anymore. Instead, be the one who says. “Let’s impose a 30-day moratorium on all of our advertising until we can sort this out.” It gives you time to regroup. It takes the pressure off you from the public. And it also allows the lawmakers to declare a win in that area. So, it’s, it’s from a PR point of view, it’s really important that these guys get ahead of it. That would be our counsel I think to any company that called us today.

Michael Graham [00:23:46] What do you think about something proactive, like starting a web start effort to urge kids not too vape? To affirmatively attack the youth vaping. “We’re telling you not to do it.”

Robb Atkinson [00:23:59] It’s difficult because the youth all call it Juuling. They don’t call it vaping anymore. They call it Juuling. So how do you identify that? The other thing that’s interesting too is if you were to ask most kids about Juuling versus vaping, and I think Dr. Budnitz talked about this is that they don’t even realize that Juuling is vaping. So, you know, there could be a fairly comprehensive education strategy that you go out into the market, and that could benefit you. But again, it’s difficult. I mean right now you have the big every, every you know you see that big tobacco against ads on TV right now, but people are still smoking.

Michael Graham [00:24:35] I think it’s the youth part that is that’s the energy the emotional energy behind this. If a bunch of ex-smokers were now vaping, and then there was this controversy about health whatever. I don’t think you’d have the same passion where you’ve got now are angry parents who are catching their kids vaping and now you’ve got these, these health risks or potential risks or. We still know so little about the health risks. You put this mishmash together. I’m going to throw you guys a curveball. You talked about a product that has a whole market that doesn’t involve kids, but kids have gotten involved, and kids’ health has gotten involved. Whether that was their intention, as some suspect or not. Do you remember when the dirt detergent pods for your washing machine first hit? It was so handy, it was so convenient. So you’re, you’re Tide and you have the first problem, which is small children apparently mistaking your detergent dishwasher things whatever, for, now it’s not just Tide, obviously. And then you have the second part, which is dopey teenagers are doing it on purpose. How do you send the message of. “Really everything’s fine. These kids are idiots.” I mean can you do that? I don’t know that that’s a marketing strategy. I don’t know.

Robb Atkinson [00:25:38] But you know, you can see, I think even if you look on Tide. Now there is something that’s hard for the consumption on it because it was such a problem.

Linda Fanaras [00:25:45] A marketing expert needs to look at a situation or a campaign from every possible angle. And I’m not saying that they would know that this would happen with those pods. However, even from the viewpoint of what we’re talking about today when we’re developing ads that actually have kids on them. I mean, it’s clear that we’re not targeting adults here. We’re targeting teenagers, people in their 20s. And I think that that’s the difference is that we really have to every, every company, especially these large corporations need to be intrinsic when they take a look at their marketing strategy and think about every possible angle. Whether it’s a kid deciding to eat a pod, or a kid deciding to you know Juul.

Michael Graham [00:26:26] Any final thoughts on Juul and its brand. And can it survive the perception that it has been targeting America’s kids during this health risk?

Robb Atkinson [00:26:39] Yeah, it’ll definitely survive. They’re going to have to make some concession and they’re going to have to start changing the way they do this grassroots campaign, to get people adults to affirm that this is a good product for them is probably a good first step, but they need to take more steps in order to protect children.

Linda Fanaras [00:26:56] Yeah, I agree with that and I think they have to be very clear about their messaging. I mean, I think they have to take a serious look on how they’re marketing this and definitely be more targeted to that larger demographic, because technically you know that was the goal of these cigarettes not, not the younger population.

Michael Graham [00:27:14] And now it’s time for this week’s marketing winners and losers. But first, we’ve got a marketing 101 tip from Linda. Linda, what’s your tip this week?

Linda Fanaras [00:27:22] I would say every single company should have a set of foundational talking points. You may have five or six key talking points that talk about, “you were founded at this particular day, and you do X Y Z, and these are the products that you offer, and these are the benefits that you bring to the market.” So on and so forth. So, it is sort of an overview of what your company has to offer. And in the event that a crisis happens, what you can do is add to those talking points. If something happens, you know you want to come out with some honest open statements around that and address this and that’s when you would develop some, some concepts around that. Somebody says you know, the beef patties are not 100 percent beef, they’re 98 percent beef, right? So we would say our beef patties are guaranteed to be a 100 percent beef patties, and that’s a talking point where you’re making us very direct statement and a truthful statement. So it’s making sure that you develop those statements so you can present that to the media when the time comes.

Michael Graham [00:28:23] It seems to have these in advance ready to go?

Linda Fanaras [00:28:25] At least the foundational ones. The crisis ones are obviously crisis-related and you have to act fast.

Michael Graham [00:28:31] OK. So winners and losers. Who is our winner of the week Rob?

Robb Atkinson [00:28:35] So, it’s funny you bring up burgers. The winner of the week is Burger King, Argentina. Michael did you see what happened this week?.

Michael Graham [00:28:42] No, I did not.

Robb Atkinson [00:28:43] Burger King, Argentina, all the Burger Kings in Argentina, decided not to sell whoppers to customers for one day, on the same day that McDonald’s was having a charity event that every Big Mac they sold, that money was going to help to fight kids with cancer. Burger King sent all of their customers over to McDonald’s to buy Big Macs and I think they are winners for doing that. They got brand appeal. People talked about them. It was written all over the world. In fact, you’re gonna love this. The Burger King himself went into McDonald’s and bought a Big Mac that day. That’s brilliant.

Michael Graham [00:29:22] That is amazing, absolutely. It’s hard to get royalty to go.

Robb Atkinson [00:29:26] Especially on his schedule. You know I mean you know?

Michael Graham [00:29:28] And our loser this week Linda?

Linda Fanaras [00:29:31] So, Japan Air allows you to find out if you’re going to be sitting beside a young child. In the event that you do not want to be sitting beside a baby or somebody crying, some people may think this is a pro, I don’t think it’s an appeal.

Robb Atkinson [00:29:47] Let me get this right. So, when you go on a book there’s a little baby icon on the seat?

Linda Fanaras [00:29:52] You got that right.

Robb Atkinson [00:29:53] So you don’t have to sit next to them?

Linda Fanaras [00:29:54] Not if you don’t want to.

Michael Graham [00:29:56] So I’m lost. I thought we were doing the loser of the week. There you have it from Linda Fanaras and Rob Atkinson, here at Millennium Agency. It’s another edition of Marketing Murder Mystery. Check out all our podcasts, they are on Soundcloud and they’re on Apple. So, just find, subscribe, and enjoy. I’m your host Michael Graham.