I’m Sorry…Now, that I have your attention
Over the past year, corporations of all shapes and sizes have embraced a teenagers cree- “If I admit it, and apologize now, I’ll be in less trouble”. We saw it with Groupon’s Super Bowl Gaffe, Kenneth Cole’s Twitter travesty and most recently Netflix’s Fee hike that helped introduce Quickster (It’s exceptionally bad when you need an apology for your apology speech).
It’s such a popular thing to do that Domino’s built an entire Marketing campaign around their Mea Culpa. It started with saying they had “cardboard pizza” and now it’s on to attacking the cheesy goodness of their breadsticks. I’m hoping they stop attacking their products before they reach the cinnamon sticks. You see- I LOVE Domino’s cinnamon sticks and will be terribly offended if they say it’s awful- I mean what does that say about my taste buds? I’m warning you, Dominos. Don’t touch the cinnamon sticks.
Now that I’ve warned Dominos, I must say that as a marketer, I believe that the Mea Culpa is not the best marketing plan. In fact it’s a risky short term plan and does damage to your brand equity. It’s like the Boy who cried wolf- It only counts the first time and then people quit believing you. Remember that GroupOn- the superbowl isn’t that far away.
However, This Thanksgiving I came across the very first “I’m sorry” that I believed and at the same time endeared the brand to me and inspired this post.
This is their apology:
This is their product:
Genius. It cracked me up and spoke to every single beer lover at our table. We passed the box around so everyone could read it and then talked about how awesome it was that they took their operations gaffe to heart and then could have some fun with it. Multiple people at dinner posted the box on their Facebook accounts, and some even tweeted about how it sucked that it happened but at least they made a good beer. It also made us really want to try the feared BrownShugga Ale, so I put a reminder in my ICal to look for it next Thanksgiving. Don’t mess up again, Lagunitas.
Seriously though, Great job Lagunitas Brewing Company. You have a fan now and I hope that BrownShugga is as good as Holiday Ale.
