A pregnancy, no matter how carefully planned or how successful you are, is a major life change. No parent has a kid and just keeps rolling as they did before. And, yet, it’s surprising how many people think that’s the way it works, and how many of them seem to work in marketing departments. In this case, they’re working for Burger King’s Russian operations, and boy is this campaign a doozy.
As reported by the Guardian, the campaign offered the equivalent of $47,000 and free Whoppers for life if Russian women would go out and get impregnated by a soccer player. Just how this would be verified, and how an endless cascade of Whoppers would make up for all that would be horrible for any poor kid growing up conceived as a cash grab and possibly with a father unable to care for him thousands of miles away, wasn’t discussed. Needless to say, the second an adult was in the room, it got pulled and Burger King offered an apology.
It’s worth remembering that this isn’t to do with Burger King’s North American operations: Burger King, in Russia, is run by a master franchisee called Burger Rus. Still, considering that in North America, the King has dealt with serious social topics like net neutrality, it might be time for them to have a serious talk with their Russian counterparts.
(via The Guardian)
