First…what is cause marketing?

Cause marketing is when a brand ties your purchase to a social or environmental cause…so shopping feels like “making a difference.” It can appear to be charity or activism on the surface, but is it? Don’t worry…we’ll get into that!

Cause marketing comes in many forms (we encounter them everywhere these days):

Buy one, give one: An item is donated for every item sold. See also: planting a tree for every product sold. Usually any donation is contingent upon you buying something.
% of profits donated: A portion of profits from this collection/product or today’s sales will be donated to a charity. A brand might donate 1-10% of sales…while keeping 90-99% of the profits. Once again, any donation is contingent on you buying something.
Round up at checkout: The cashier (or kiosk or website) will ask you if you want to round up your total. You’re funding the donation while the brand takes the credit.

Brands LOVE cause marketing!

Why? It works…and it’s a form of marketing that costs little-to-nothing!

It drives sales when business is slow. Retailers found during the Great Recession that customers who were feeling broke were more likely to open their wallets when product had a giveback attached to it.
It’s free PR + social media content. And usually the time (aka wages) used to create that content are also deducted from the profits before making a donation.
It makes them look ethical without changing their practices. It’s so much cheaper than making real, systemic changes. Why pay their garment workers a living wage when they could just donate 1% of sales to a charity!
It taps into our guilt + desire to “do good.” It turns shopping into a feel-good activity…and that leads to more impulse buys.

Before you start drafting that spicy email to me…

I do not think it is scammy or some kind of cynical marketing play when small businesses donate a portion of sales or hold fundraisers for causes.

After all, the thing about small businesses is they usually are run by one or two people, so they don’t need to pretend to be actual, sincere people.

And when they engage in charitable stuff, it’s because it really matters to them. They are literally giving away their time and/or money.

Cause marketing wants you to feel like shopping is a form of activism.

Spoiler: It’s not!

Authentic desire for a better world?

Eh, not so much.

Companies may engage in “cause washing” without any real commitment to actual long term support of that cause. Why? Because real change costs money and takes time. A marketing story with a giveback rarely costs companies anything…because it is engineered to be profitable, even when a donation is involved!

Furthermore, it gives companies a chance to hide unethical practices. A company might say it cares about women’s rights or climate change for a marketing story.

…but behind the scenes it’s underpaying its garment workers, wasting water, or doing nothing to reduce its carbon emissions. Or it says it supports artists and makers…and then steals their designs. Cause marketing is a great distraction!

Cause marketing commercializes social issues.

Cause marketing takes serious problems and turns them into marketing opportunities. It sells the illusion that we can shop our way to a better world….and we can’t!

No “conscious” collection or Earth Day tee or feminist tee is going to ever fix the problems our world is facing. Like, not even a little bit. A pithy donation of 1% of sales of one certain item or collection isn’t going to either.

It’s super inefficient!

Cause marketing is often an inefficient way to give, thanks to timing and lack of transparency in terms of the actual amount of the donation.

Brands might donate only a few cents per item while spending much more on advertising the partnership. And sure, they could have skipped the entire campaign and just donated that marketing budget…but how would that motivate us to shop?
Donations usually happen long after the campaign ends, after finance has had a chance to reconcile all of the expenses of the campaign. In urgent situations, that reduces the impact of the donation.
“A portion of profits” can mean almost nothing because brands deduct costs like ads, staff, packaging, shipping, etc. “Proceeds” is even murkier…it could mean profits…or sales.
Transparency is rare, and by the time donations are made, most people have forgotten.

Companies tend to pick the most popular, non-controversial causes to support because they won’t alienate customers or be less appealing and marketable.

What about those “round up” at checkout campaigns?

Oh, you mean those times I get to experience social coercion and awkwardness when I’m just trying to buy a burrito or pick up my prescription?
This version of cause marketing has all of the same drawbacks as any other cause marketing campaign:

Brands cherry pick charities that are most appealing and least controversial.
The timeline of when the actual donation is made is kinda unclear.
Retail staff are pressured to get as many donations as possible…which just makes the whole thing more uncomfortable for everyone.
Companies get the marketing win of donation…but via your money, not their own.
And of course, why aren’t these companies just donating that money themselves?

Cause marketing exploits our desire to do good, making us feel good about purchases that we might have never made…while creating a smokescreen for companies with less-than-stellar policies on human rights and environmental responsibility.

In fact, any time a retail company is doing a giveback campaign of some sort, I’m like,“what about your retail workers? What about your warehouse workers? What about your factories? Start by caring for those people properly…and then you won’t need to trick us into buying stuff from your latest cause washing campaign, because we will know that you are the right place to spend money for things we need.”

Because that’s the thing about cause marketing: it’s not charity. It’s marketing.

Brands shouldn’t serve as intermediaries for charitable giving (it’s kinda weird when you think about it). Why aren’t they just donating money themselves?!

Let’s talk about tax deductions!

ROUND UP CAMPAIGNS: In the United States, companies do NOT get to write off the donations from these round up campaigns on their taxes. There is a lot of misinformation on the internet about this. However, if a company raises $10,000 from a campaign and decides to throw in a $1,000 of their own money…then they CAN write off the $1,000, but that’s it.

“BUY ONE, GIVE ONE” and “A PORTION OF PROFITS:” Companies CAN write off that donation on their taxes.

Want to learn more about cause marketing and cause washing? Check out Part 3 in the “I’m with the brand” series of podcast episodes!

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Selina Sanders, a social impact brand that specializes in up-cycled clothing, using only reclaimed, vintage or thrifted materials: from tea towels, linens, blankets and quilts. Sustainably crafted in Los Angeles, each piece is designed to last in one’s closet for generations to come. Maximum Style; Minimal Carbon Footprint.

Salt Hats: purveyors of truly sustainable hats. Hand blocked, sewn and embellished in Detroit, Michigan.

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