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You are here: Home / Civil Rights / Racial Justice / This Week In Blackness / Hey Krispy Kreme: Don’t You Have A Black Person In Your Marketing Department?

Hey Krispy Kreme: Don’t You Have A Black Person In Your Marketing Department?

by Elon James White|  February 19, 20151:49 pm| 27 Comments

This post is in: This Week In Blackness

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In another case of “hey, you could really use a person of color on your staff,” Krispy Kreme donuts in the UK found themselves in hot water after a marketing campaign for Krispy Kreme Klub which they shortened to KKK. The program was part of a weeklong event for children on break from school. But they apologized quickly and sounded like the FBI in doing so:

“Krispy Kreme apologizes unreservedly for the inappropriate name of a customer promotion at one of our stores,” said the spokeswoman. “The promotion was never intended to cause offense. All material has been withdrawn, and an internal investigation is currently under way.”

Good thing they apologized because their donuts are delicious.

Team Blackness also discussed easy peasy tattoo removal, a California man who cried police brutality when he actually punched himself in the face, and AIDS has become the top killer of adolescents in Africa.

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27Comments

  1. 1.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    February 19, 2015 at 2:21 pm

    The one defense I’ll give them is that the KKK was a US-only phenomenon, so those initials wouldn’t automatically raise the same alarm bells in the UK as they would in the US. Still a pretty embarrassing own goal, though.

  2. 2.

    boatboy_srq

    February 19, 2015 at 2:26 pm

    Krispy Kreme. Based in Winston-Salem, NC. They had to know this wouldn’t end well.

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): KKK may be a majority-US phenomenon, but a good portion of the rest of the planet is aware of the Klan – enough to make some noise about a misstep like this. OTOH, my guess is the Klan is one of those “negative” things expunged from the TX schoolbooks.

  3. 3.

    Nick

    February 19, 2015 at 2:29 pm

    I’m fairly sympathetic to this kind of screw-up — why should other countries be sensitive to our atrocities? I doubt we vet our ad campaigns to make sure they don’t accidentally have the initials of bigoted organizations in Australia or Italy. Insisting on the universality of our bad guys is another form of American exceptionalism.

  4. 4.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    February 19, 2015 at 2:32 pm

    @boatboy_srq:

    As far as I’ve heard, this was a local franchise in the UK making the decision. Sure, they’ve probably heard of the KKK. One or two of them probably saw “Django Unchained” or “O Brother Where Art Thou.”

    But the KKK doesn’t have the same deep cultural significance in the UK that it does in the US, so I can see how local UK franchise could fuck up that way. As the cliche says, we are two peoples separated by a common language.

  5. 5.

    boatboy_srq

    February 19, 2015 at 2:34 pm

    @Nick: If this were an enterprise not headquartered in the Deep South, I’d agree. Though it’s quite possible that some UK junior exec thought this up as something cutesy and the biggest complaints came not from UK consumers but corporate HQ. There’s also the insanely offensive connotation to the acronym that resonates outside US cultural spheres that doesn’t in the Chevy Nova (“no va” doesn’t sell in Latin America) or the Alfa 164 (Chinese numerology made that “all the way to death” in Hong Kong, so Alfa had to rebadge those cars).

  6. 6.

    MazeDancer

    February 19, 2015 at 2:35 pm

    They’re British, but it’s still absurd.

    Every name – and especially every acronym – used for products and promotions if created by a reliable ad agency or consultant automatically gets Google searched. For many reasons, not the least of which it prevents self-inflicted wounds like this.

  7. 7.

    John

    February 19, 2015 at 2:40 pm

    How many Americans do you think would be up in arms if some company created a marketing campaign with the initials BNP? My guess is somewhere in the single digits.

    Americans are waaaaaay too self-absorbed.

  8. 8.

    Tree With Water

    February 19, 2015 at 2:42 pm

    I can see that occurring overseas. While even/especially the uneducated here in the states are universally familiar with the import of those three, simple letters KKK, it’s a bit parochial to hold damn foreigners to our high bar of cultural vernacular.

  9. 9.

    Paul in KY

    February 19, 2015 at 2:47 pm

    I have a cousin who used a power sander to remove a tattoo of an old flame. Still has a mark (of course), but no name remains.

  10. 10.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    February 19, 2015 at 2:48 pm

    @John:

    I have seen quite a few Americans get up in arms when someone orders a “black and tan” in a bar because it’s a reference to the British occupation of Ireland. I even had someone here scold me for posting a recipe for Black and Tan Macaroni and Cheese. So it does occasionally happen.

  11. 11.

    Roger Moore

    February 19, 2015 at 2:50 pm

    @boatboy_srq:

    OTOH, my guess is the Klan is one of those “negative” things expunged from the TX schoolbooks.

    I bet not. I would assume Texas’s school books follow the Lost Cause version of history, which would treat the Klan as a natural part of the South’s reaction to scalawags and carpetbaggers.

  12. 12.

    Mike J

    February 19, 2015 at 2:52 pm

    I will give them credit for this: “Krispy Kreme apologizes unreservedly for the inappropriate name of a customer promotion at one of our stores,”

    They didn’t say, “we’re sorry if anybody was offended.” They didn’t complain about PC thugs victimizing the poor helpless corporation. They admitted they made a mistake and they made an actual apology. They did exactly what decent people would do when they screwed up.

    Pity that it’s so rare that it’s notable.

  13. 13.

    Roger Moore

    February 19, 2015 at 2:57 pm

    @boatboy_srq:

    “no va” doesn’t sell in Latin America

    You might want to check Snopes about that one.

  14. 14.

    Betty Cracker

    February 19, 2015 at 3:06 pm

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): I hope you told them to go pound sand.

  15. 15.

    mai naem mobile

    February 19, 2015 at 3:10 pm

    I lived in the UK for a few years. The racist group in the UK group is called the National Front. They do the skinhead stuff but they really don’t measure up to KKK standards. I think if you used National Front for something in this country people probably wouldn’t think anything of it. Granted I was young but I don’t believe I was aware of the KKK until I came here.

  16. 16.

    Paul in KY

    February 19, 2015 at 3:13 pm

    @Roger Moore: Thanks for that link.

  17. 17.

    Mike G

    February 19, 2015 at 3:22 pm

    It doesn’t have the same resonance abroad but people in other Western countries know what the KKK is from American TV and movies. It’s probably one of most recognized historical symbols of the South internationally.

    Krispy Kreme is a corporation based in the US South, so I imagine some smart-ass in their UK marketing department thought it would be clever to make a joke playing on a symbol of that region that would be recognized in UK. I’m surprised they didn’t have at least one American staffer there to put the brakes on it.

    These kind of cross-cultural conflicts happen a lot in the age of globalization. There used to be a popular brand of toothpaste in Asia called “Darkie” with a picture of Al Jolson on it, until the maker was bought by a US company and they quickly changed the name. And there was an importer of German-made gas heaters in Taiwan using a cartoon Hitler in their ads (“A symbol of strength”, they said) until the German embassy kicked up a stink.

  18. 18.

    Origuy

    February 19, 2015 at 3:23 pm

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): The Black and Tans was the nickname for a reserve force of British constables formed to keep order during the Irish War of Independence. They were particularly brutal, being made up of WWI veterans with little police training. You could probably get away with ordering a Black and Tan in a Prot bar in Northern Ireland, but not in the Republic.

    Don’t order an “Irish Car Bomb” in Ireland, either.

    I really don’t think the local Krispy Kreme people in the UK had any idea about the significance of KKK to Americans. The sign has the name “Hull” on it, so it was a local promotion.

  19. 19.

    FridayNext

    February 19, 2015 at 3:31 pm

    A lot of people are offering qualified defenses of this store because it is in the UK. Well, possibly. But it seems to me if you are a company with the initials KK, it would be standard corporate policy to NEVER use another word with a K in anything ever. I have worked in food franchises before as well as for companies with brands to protect and if it’s your job to design or place ads, you are typically given a two inch thick binder of regulations of how to use the logo, what colors you have to use and cannot use, and even where you are allowed to place ads, how they should look, what phrases you can use, what the product must look like, etc etc. It’s typically mind-numbingly detailed and if Krispy Kreme didn’t give instructions to never use a third “k” word, let alone as initials, they really should have, and I suspect they will now.

    Sure it’s the UK, but it is a US company from the South and in the internet age, the corporate headquarters has to be more aware of such things, and hiring more black people in head offices would likely help.

    ETA: BTW, wasn’t this on the Simpsons? Krusty’s Kartoon Kavalcade?

  20. 20.

    gvg

    February 19, 2015 at 3:56 pm

    Companies usually DO look out for cultural mistakes when they sell in other countries. Too many not very funny stories out there. I guess I can see it since it was a little local promotion although if I was a big shot in Krispy Kreme I would be looking for a not very funny prankster in either KK or the ad company.
    I had not known about the Black and Tan connotation and I’m nominally of Irish descent. I thought they were a kind of hound dog. I guess I pay more attention to pets than Irish history.

  21. 21.

    NCSteve

    February 19, 2015 at 4:09 pm

    @boatboy_srq: If corporate in Winston Salem had had a clue this was coming, they would have squelched it like a fat ass sitting on a jelly doughnut. If there’s one thing Krispy Kreme’s top marketing executives are constantly aware of it’s that they’re constantly one “K” away from a public relations disaster.

    Points are lost for failure to transmit that fact to their overseas operations, however.

  22. 22.

    Alien_radio

    February 19, 2015 at 4:31 pm

    http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/Krusty_Komedy_Klassics

  23. 23.

    ThresherK

    February 19, 2015 at 4:43 pm

    @Alien_radio: Thankyouthankyouthankyou. I was waiting for someone to bring that up.

  24. 24.

    ThresherK

    February 19, 2015 at 4:47 pm

    @Alien_radio: One good TVTropes turn:

    Rule of Three: Combined with Inherently Funny Words. Thurgood is working on a stand up act and the book he got on how to be funny says things in threes are funny, as well as words with a hard k (like knish, tukas, fakakta). He logically assumes then that the funniest thing ever is…

    Well, I’ll let you finish the thought.

  25. 25.

    kc

    February 19, 2015 at 5:59 pm

    @Betty Cracker:

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): I hope you told them to go pound sand.

    *Googles to see if the phrase “pound sand” might offend anyone*

  26. 26.

    ShadeTail

    February 19, 2015 at 10:12 pm

    Good thing they apologized because their donuts are delicious.

    I can only assume this is sarcasm, because their donuts are utter shit.

  27. 27.

    Tara the Antisocial Social Worker

    February 19, 2015 at 11:18 pm

    Honest to Goddess, earlier today I saw a truck for an exterminator company painted with the slogan “We are the final solution.”

    WTF?

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