Let’s be honest, McDonald’s is soo GOOD!! Their big mac, heaven!! Also, everyone has questions about this fast food restaurant. You remember that campaign about those moms visiting the McDonald’s plant. They wanted to prove that the average mom would feel better about feeding their kids McDonald’s if they knew where the food came from. Plus, to prove to everyone else watching, that McDonald’s isn’t as bad as you think they are.

After that, media blew up with questions! Then the below video was made, explaining why the burgers in the ads are three times larger than the actual thing. 

That’s when it got real! It became aware that MacDonald’s is not just another fast food joint; it’s a restaurant that understands their customer’s concerns and listens to their questions. 

Not a lot of fast food restaurants actually do this, in fact, they just ignore it. People may assume this campaign is just another stunt MacDonald’s is pulling to just stop customers from complaining, I think that’s not true. What company would take that much time and effort in building a huge campaign like this if they didn’t really believe in their brand and what it has to offer its customers.

Check out the below outdoor ads all over the subway. Neat, in it? There’s even the iconic large ad burger versus the small real burger from the above video.

The campaign consisted of ads with questions straight from the consumer. Most of those have the answer written or illustrated to show that, McDonald’s is not hiding anything!

Pic one: “Only thigh, leg, breast, not the rest”

Is the McChicen really made from ground up pieces of chicken that cant be used for anything else and then breaded?                           

Pic two: “100% Beef not 100% Cow”   

 (description of the above two pictures) not a lot of people believe that McDonald’s uses the better parts of the animal in order to create their products so these had to be illustrated. Think about it, majority of their products are meat based, if the food chain could not openly answer that question, then there shouldn’t even be a campaign!

A personal favourite! “Why does my food never look like the food in your (McDonald’s) ads?” That is a great question and these ads are the reason for consumers’ scepticism towards advertising. 

These ads include the various questions consumers have about the restaurant plastered all over.  Questions like “why is there no veggie burger” or “what is the secret big mac cause” which are very valid questions. Now that I think about it, why aren’t there any veggie burgers?! If you ever plan on going to India, visit the local McDonald’s and check out their different menu catered the target. There’s a McVeggie, so why not in Canada?

With so many questions, it’s only logical to place them as ads all over. 

Now, this is a campaign, not a direct conference between customer and company.  So why would you even believe what is plastered all over town, from McDonald’s? Well, the first clause in the Canadian Code of Advertising Standards (ASC) it’s stated:

“(a) Advertisements must not contain inaccurate, deceptive or otherwise misleading claims, statements, illustrations or representations, either direct or implied, with regard to any identified or identifiable product(s) or service(s).”

Come on, how can you not believe what they say after that? 

After researching this campaign for this blog post, I thought I would have an altered view of he fast food chain, if not a complete different one. However,  I just feel like it’s better that I know, but it wont provoke me to eating more of MacDonald’s. At the end of the day a burger is a burger is a burger, and fries.  MacDonald’s just happens to have really tasty ones in comparison to the rest of the fast food restaurants with similar burgers.

At the end of the day, it’s about making the customer feel comfortable and having them understand that it’s not bad food. I mean, it’s not my mums cooking, that’s for sure, but it’s not that bad either.

Good for them for opening up and showing exactly what they are made of, literally! It takes a lot for a company so scrutinized by every little thing they do, to open up, admit and answer whatever was questioned. Good Job! Vault worthy material! 

ASC source: The 14 Clauses of the Canadian Code of Advertising Standards 

As you all know there was a very tragic incident that occurred in Newtown, Connecticut at Sandy Hook Elementary School resulting in losing 26 innocent lives. This post is not about the shooting in detail but about how we can pay tribute and honor to those lost as individuals and community as a whole.

In remembrance of those no longer with us, this movement has begun by encouraging everyone to perform 26 random acts of kindness. One random act of kindness for each individual killed.

This is not a campaign to drive more engagement, its genuine kindness from one person to another during your day to day activities.  Personally, this is a great way to demonstrate to the world that good things do happen and how much one small kind act influences people’s live.

Examples of such an act could be paying for someone’s coffee one day, or giving a random person a gift or maybe even giving those less fortunate than us clothes, food or blankets.

To inspire you all, check out the below random acts of kindness.

100% tip for a server at one of my favorite lunch spots!

Instead of asking Santa for something, they brought him a Starbucks gift card

First act of kindness: paying for the car behind us crossing over the bridge

An amazing woman just came in and did this & tipped us $20. There are beautiful people in the world

Felt awesome to leave this on a car in the parking lot today. Not life changing but kindness is contagious

A latte for the kind security guard who stands outside our building, rain or shine, making sure we are safe

This note and $ was given to my son today this afternoon by a complete stranger.

What an amazing idea. I plan on joining in and paying it forward.

We made cookies for our firemen and even got to play dress up

26 cuddly toys for the children’s ward at Torbay Hospital

Over halfway there! Just left $10 in my favorite childhood book

The custodian is using tape to hold his shoes together. He works hard and deserves new shoes

I am a teacher in Connecticut and I was the recipient of a #26Acts today from one of my 7th-graders

For those interested, feel free to use the sheet below to honor all 26 lives that should not have been lost.

These acts can be whenever, wherever and to whomever. To help you out, maybe perform one act per day or 26 all at once. If you have twitter, #26randomactsofkindness or Facebook.com/26acts and show the world that 26 small random kind acts mean the world to someone.  This should not be a ‘time of the year’ act, it should be year round but this is a great time to start! Give kindly. Give tribute and honor.

For more information and examples click here. 

To promote its new Intense Hydration line, Burt’s Bees placed a clever “interactive” billboard on a busy street in Minneapolis.

The sign showed a woman whose dry skin was made up of thousands of product coupons. These “flakes” were peeled away by folks passing by over the course of a day, revealing an image of the same model with a creamier (presumably hydrated) complexion.  The “before and after” effect can be seen in the time-lapse clip below, and the still images below that.

The video sends you to Burt’s Facebook page, where you can get your own coupons. The video by Baldwin& has garnered 30,000 YouTube views in a week.

That’s fairly sweet for Burt’s Bees, which, let’s face it, isn’t exactly the sexiest drone in the hive. It’s kind of creepy to think that passersby were symbolically peeling off a human being’s skin. But this is Minneapolis, so I guess anything goes.

The client was lucky some joker didn’t come along right at the beginning and snatch all 1,300 coupons in a skin-care-savings frenzy, forcing them to set up the whole thing again.