A closer look on Greenpeace campaign against Nestlé's use of unsustainable Palm Oil

Greenpeace VS Kit Katbriefly

March 2010 Greenpeace launched a campaign against Nestle using unsustainable palm oil in their Kit Kat product.

The campaign includes a gore video of an office worker eating an orangutan finger instead of a Kit Kat bar

The campaign became global with many people boycotting the brand on Facebook, twitter, YouTube, etc.

Nestlé's Facebook page was under the toughest attack, with people begging the company to stop using palm oil produced from the natural habitat of the orangutans

Nestle deleted the comments May 2010 Nestle announced it would stop using

unsustainable palm oil

Corporate Social Responsibility - theory

CSR is a broad concept, which include crisis management, reputation management, volunteering in the community and different programmes for employees. Tench and Yeomans (2006) describe CSR as enlightened self-interest – the way organisations plan and execute the relationships with their stakeholders. The authors also say that even though the organisations are not countries they must acknowledge the impact they have on the environment and the society and therefore should look after them properly.

The Importance of CSR

Corporate Social Responsibility is one of the biggest corporate issues these days. Companies can and should monitor all the suppliers and parties involved in the processes of the organisation in order to be sure that all actions are legal and responsible.

What does CSR mean for Nestle

previous CSR problems

Nestle has been trying to present itself as a good corporate citizen but facts speak for themselves: The baby milk scandal starting in 1977, where

Nestle promotes formula as the healthier option

Fake milk scandal where babies in Africa and China die because of Nestlé's baby milk

“Need for cheap palm oil drives deforestation”(The Telegraph, 2007)

THE CAMPAIGN: what happened after Greenpeace has launched the video?

Nestle tried to get the video censored and take it off YouTube

The video becomes viral because of the censorship attempt

In march 2010 there were 68 related YouTube videos that attracted 1.2 million views.

The conversation against Kit Kat transfers to Nestlé's Facebook page and Nestle started deleting negative comments and putting bans on fans who speak negatively about the brand and the company

• People started boycotting Nestle on their own Facebook page

• Nestle could not handle people using modified versions of their logo as a profile picture and threatened to delete comments from those users.

• Nestlé's social media PR team makes another serious mistake by the personal way they respond to posts. That is absolutely inappropriate for any company let along a big corporation dealing with a PR disaster like Nestle

The outcome of these comments is that Nestlé's Facebook rep appologises for deleting posts and for being rude.

• Negative twitter comments about “Nestle Palm Oil” appear every 15 minutes

• The press picked up the story and publications in The Economist, The Guardian and The Wall Street Journal appear

The ScoreboardGreenpeace has succeeded in conducting a viral

social media campaign

1.2 million YouTube videos with negative content about Nestle using unsustainable palm oil

95.000 Nestle Facebook fans seeing negative comments

Negative tweets The press is spreading the story

- So, where did Nestle go wrong?- Almost everywhere.

Crisis Management Nestle had to deal with a PR disaster. Methods for

crisis management should have been used. It is true that they responded to the messages sent from the stakeholders but the way they responded is unprofessional and not helpful at all.

They also tried to lean on copyright and delete comments from people with altered Nestlé's logo but that did not solve any problems

Nestle posted on their website that they terminated the contract with their Palm oil supplier in Indonesia – too little too late for the publics involved

Nestle promised to use only “certified sustainable palm oil by 2015” – which is a long-term solution to the PR crisis. Why not start today?

Lessons to be learnt for next time

because with Nestle it seems that there’s always a next time

Even if you have social media presence that does not mean that it fixes offline problems Even if Nestlé's Facebook team was properly trained

in crisis management and handled the problem differently, the fact that Nestle takes part in deforestation cannot be deleted.

Always be prepared with proper answers for the publics’ questions. Something that Nestle obviously lacked.

It is not that important if you cannot enhance the brand through social media but it is a crisis if there is a miscommunication. Many people got offended by the way they were

spoken to on Facebook and that added up to the overall dissatisfaction

Companies do not need any social media presence. They need a well-planned, well-managed presence.

DO NOT censor – it may have been OK 20 years ago but not in the times we are living in No one likes to be told to shut up, especially when feeling

they have have something important to say. And that is just what Nestle did to their fans.

You cannot solve social media crisis with traditional media channels. Although a press release was sent and an announcement

on the website was posted, the crisis has to be managed where it is happening

Absence from social media is not a solution Even if Nestle were not online, the Greenpeace

supporters would have still spread the word

References BBC., 2004. China 'fake milk' scandal deepens. BBC NEWS,

[Internet] 22 April. p. Available at:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/3648583.stm [Accessed 15 March 2011].

Eccleston, P., 2007. Need for cheap palm oil drives deforestation. The Telegraph, [Internet] 8 November. p. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/3313623/Need-for-cheap-palm-oil-drives-deforestation.html [Accessed 15 March 2011].

Keane, M., 2010. Nestle incites the social media mob after Greenpeace campaign. Econsultancy Digital Marketers United, [Internet] 19 March. p. Available at: http://econsultancy.com/uk/blog/5625-nestle-fails-to-tame-the-social-media-mob [Accessed 15 March 2011]. 

L‟Etang, J and Pieczka, M (2006) Public Relations, Critical Debates and Contemporary Practice Lawrence Erlbaum

Tench, R. & Yeomans, L. (2006) Exploring public relations. Harlow: Prentice Hall.

References Owyang, J., 2010. Greenpeace Vs. Brands: Social Media Attacks

To Continue. Forbes, [Internet] 19 July. p. Available at: http://www.forbes.com/2010/07/19/greenpeace-bp-nestle-twitter-facebook-forbes-cmo-network-jeremiah-owyang.html [Accessed 15 March 2011]. 

Steel, E., 2010. Nestlé Takes a Beating on Social-Media Sites. The Wall Street Journal, [Internet] 29 March. p. Available at:http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304434404575149883850508158.html [Accessed 15 March 2011]. 

Sudhaman, A., 2010. Nestle Briefs Agencies For Online Charm Offensive To Counter Criticism.PRWEEK, [Internet] 3 February. p. Available at:http://www.prweek.com/channel/ConsumerEntertainment/article/981443/Nestle%20briefs%20agencies%20for%20online%20charm%20offensive%20to%20counter%20criticism/[Accessed 15 March 2011]. 

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