CONTACT PEPSI. Tell them to drop their 6A Sponsorship!

[mijan]

Please forgive the lack of an LJ-cut, but I want to get everyone's attention.  I'm sure you know about this by now:
http://news.livejournal.com/102286.html
(Make sure you've read the article on LJ-news before you do anything else.)  In response to the new Pepsi advertisements, V-gifts, and logos all over the place, in VIOLATION of LJ's customer contracts, I say we take a stand, and hit Six Apart where it counts.

I just got off the phone with Pepsi Customer Relations.  I told them that Pepsi's corporate sponsorship of Six Apart might be a very bad publicity move. I explained that Six Apart had, over the past several months, created a couple of nasty customer service snafus, leading to horrible customer relations. I mentioned how the last time Six Apart and Livejournal irritated us, we did a bit of a census to see how many of us were angry (do you remember "fandom_counts"?), and we raised a count of over 30,000 people in just a few short days. That's power in numbers.  As I continued to explain, I said that Six Apart is now violating customer contracts by placing advertisements on Paid Accounts, which is infuriating a lot of customers all over again. The advertisements they're using are Pepsi advertisements, which I'm certain hadn't been Pepsico's intent. I pointed out that I was sure Pepsi wouldn't want its own logo to be used in advertising that violated customer contracts. So, basically, we're getting spammed with Pepsi advertisements, which, if anything, is bad publicity for Pepsi, and could easily lead to people refusing to buy Pepsi products on principle. I didn't say that there was any boycott of any sort being discussed - however, I did say that it was enough to make me stop buyng Pepsi products, and it would probably have the same effect on other people as well.  In other words, Pepsi's own advertising campaign could backfire and give them negative publicity if they continue with Six Apart.

Pepsi is a large enough corporation that they don't need the headache of dealing with a corporate cockroach like Six Apart. If Pepsi smells bad publicity, they'll bail. I'm NOT, repeat NOT doing this to hurt Pepsi. (If you call Pepsi, make sure you do it with full awareness that this is not Pepsi's fault.)  Go into it attempting to persuade Pepsico to withdraw corporate sponsorship from Six Apart for their own corporate reputation.

So, in short, I suggested that it might bode well for Pepsi to get out of their corporate sponsorship deal with Six Apart as soon as possible.

Here's what I'm asking you to do:

CALL PEPSI.  Tell them what's happening with Six Apart.  Explain that 6A is violating customer contracts by placing Pepsi advertisements in paid accounts, and that customers of LiveJournal are angry - NOT at Pepsi, but at LiveJournal and Six Apart.  Tell them that it will look bad for Pepsi to continue advertising with Six Apart, and that Pepsi should withdraw their corporate sponsorship for their own good.  Again, don't be rude to the Pepsi people!  They have nothing to do with Six Apart's stupidity, and they probably don't even know about this.  Just pass on the information.

I didn't call the customer service line directly because I couldn't find it at first, but I got connected through the vendor's number.  I think THIS is the Customer Service line: +1(800)433-2652
Or the basic phone number for the headquarters:  +1(914)253-2000 That should connect you to anybody at the Headquarters, and I'd recommend this number most. 

Here's the link to a page listing their entire roster of Corporate executives and offices:
http://www.pepsico.com/PEP_Company/OfficersDirectors/index.cfm

Here's their address:
Pepsi Customer Relations

Pepsico, Inc

700 Anderson Hill Road
Purchase, NY 10577

(OMG... evilimp, you and your friends from your college can go directly to the office!  DO IT!  Seriously, will you???)


Also, for the UK:
PepsiCo United Kingdom
    1600 Arlington Business Park
    Theale, Reading
    Berkshire, RG7 4SA UK
    44-118-930-6666
    Salman Amin
    President

And most importantly... TELL YOUR F-LIST!  Feel free to copy/paste all of this information.  Pass it on.  Flood Pepsi with phone calls.  Hit Six Apart where it hurts the most.  Six Apart wants to piss off their original source of income - their paying customers - so we'll remove their shiny new source of income.  Come on, we're fandom.  We can do anything.  Who's with me?

Comments

[mylifewithin.livejournal.com]

Haha, you can count on me .. you will see this in a post created by me in the next couple mintues, and with all the people on my list, it will move, thank you.

[kisses]

♥

[little-werewolf.livejournal.com]

Their putting ads on paid accounts? Do they really want to get us mad now?

I wish I could phone them, being in Europe makes it difficult, even phoning to England would be something right now that doesn't go with my purse. But I'll pimp this post, you can bet on that.

[earth-magic.livejournal.com]

*Is confused*

Where are they putting adverts onto paid accounts? I don't have any on mine.

[lesetchka.livejournal.com]

well this sucks. I hate hate HATE diet coke. Love love LOVE Diet Pepsi :(

[oui-je-danse.livejournal.com]

When did this happen? Where?

[coffeejunkii.livejournal.com]

you know, i find it quite outrageous that lj is masquerading ads as gifts, too, but considering the precarious situation fandom is in right now, i'm not sure that flooding pepsi with calls is the way to go. the less limelight on fandom right now, the better. it's not like sixapart can't make the connection between the two, esp. because several fandom people have already filed complaints with lj about the pepsi-sponsored gifts.

just my two cents :)

[lizardspots.livejournal.com]

*waves* ♥

[flayer-of-minds.livejournal.com]

Far be it from me to fail to join in rebellion against corporate exploitation...=)

Have I mentioned how amazing you are?

[midnitemaraud-r.livejournal.com]

I... I hate to say it, but I think you're barking up the wrong tree. Pepsi made a deal with Live Journal/Six Apart, not with LJ/6A's customers. It's not up to Pepsi to make sure LJ/6A honors its promises to its customer base. Yes, dozens of corporate conglomerates threatened to pull their sponsorship to MSNBC when Imus made those racial remarks, but this isn't even in the same county, much less the same ballpark as that incident. People boycotted Exxon after the Valdez incident, and last I checked, especially after the multi-billion dollar merger with Mobil, they're doing just fine.

If I go to my local supermarket to buy my diet wild cherry Pepsi, and they're constantly sold out, I'm not going to call PepsiCo to demand, as an irate customer, they make sure Waldbaums supermarkets has my diet wild cherry pepsi in stock. If I have a problem, I call Waldbaums and complain. Granted, when Coca Cola changed the formula for Coke, millions of people complained. To Coca Cola. Because that was an issue with the company itself.

If people want to boycott Pepsi/Frito-Lays/KFC-Taco Bell, etc., then that's their right of course. If you want to tell Pepsi that LJ renegged on their promise to their paid customers, that's fine, too. (though I should note that it says right on the news page that paid customers won't see the sponsored copy attached to the gifts.) But to scapegoat Pepsi when it's LIVEJOURNAL that made the deal, when it's LIVEJOURNAL who renegged on its word

If the mood theme offends you (general you), and people on your flist are using it, then force your mood them on your flist, or ask the person using it to not use it, or defriend them. I have people using mood themes that I'm not particularly fond of, and some journal layouts hurt my eyes as well as my sensibilities, but who the hell am I to tell anyone what layout to use on their journal or what mood theme to choose? If you don't want to receive Vgifts, then tell your flist not to send them to you. You can't send the Pepsi ones anonymously.

I just... I don't think this is the right way to handle it. People are unhappy with Livejournal/Six Apart, and yes, with good reason. But this smacks of skirting the issue. If people are unhappy with the service LJ is providing, with its new rules and the implementation of those rules, then as a customer, you leave and take your business elsewhere. Plain and simple. When my dry cleaners raised its rates, I went and found somewhere cheaper. I grocery shop more at Stop & Shop now than I do at Waldbaums. I didn't like Ford, so when I bought a new car, I bought a Jeep.

The problem is, people are comfortable here, they like the perks, we've built our community here and we don't want to leave, but that's not really Pepsi's issue either. They made a business deal - money in exchange for advertising, and to be honest, it's a pretty good deal from a business standpoint. And I wouldn't be surprised if LJ/6A is getting more money from Pepsi than from all of our paid accounts combined.

The problem we have is with Livejournal, and Livejournal's choices and decisions, and while I understand why letting Pepsi know that we're upset is a valid avenue, I honestly don't think it's going to make one iota of difference. The Better Business Bureau is the place to lodge a complaint. Boycotting Pepsi feels... trite. Do you know what I mean?

[supremediva.livejournal.com]

I understand where you're coming from and why you're upset, but I have to decline to participate on the grounds that I do freelance field work for PepsiCo

[siriuslydlucius.livejournal.com]

Well, I’d love to, but I’m from Georgia, and I hate Pepsi anyway. I think PepsiCo knows that Coke already has this little corner of the world…

[best-of-five.livejournal.com]

i'm not on your f-list but since this post is not locked, i assume you've meant it for general consumption. i'm sorta outraged more by your action than anything i've read about LJ's marketing partnership with Pepsi.

I just got off the phone with Pepsi Customer Relations. I told them, very politely, with utmost concern for their corporate image, that their logo is being used in advertisements by Six Apart on Livejournal Paid Accounts, in violation of customer contracts. I explained how the good corporate image of Pepsi could be tarnished by their sponsorship of Six Apart. I let them know that we, the customer base of Livejournal, are infuriated at Six Apart. We're going to stop drinking Pepsi and purchasing Pepsi products. We're going to avoid anything sponsored by Pepsi. We're going to tell our local restaurants and retailers to stop carrying Pepsi.

I told the Pepsi representative that we're going to tell our friends. And there are a LOT of us. I used the estimate of 30,000 irritated fans, going by the number we got from Fandom Counts. I hope you think that's a fair number for me to use.


If all of these statements on behalf of fandom had been made AFTER you had polled and got 30k people (or actually as you mention it all of fandom) to agree with you, that's one thing. To call up a company and make these broad sweeping statements without any backup seems very outrageous to me. I for one am not planning to boycott Pepsi, LJ or anything else - I'm curious to know how you concluded that those strong statements were the general view of fandom and that you were voted as the spokesperson to voice these. I feel very uncomfortable about how you seemed to think these kinds of actions, rather than legitimizing any of fandom/LJ users concerns, just seem like broad, unbackable statements that could reduce our credibility as a whole.

[silentauror.livejournal.com]

Okay, I'm home and it's 3:30am, but I finally figured out what I wanted to say. Here's my deal: I don't have a problem with Pepsi doing this. I have a problem with LJ doing this. Does that make sense? Pepsi is a big multinational corporation and doesn't owe fandom a damned thing. That's their game, to pursue profits and advertising wherever possible. What I don't like is that LJ opened the doors to that sort of thing from any company. The fact that it's Pepsi is irrelevant to me. I care about the fact that the TOS that *I* signed when I got my account have been changed, that my service provider has broken promises. As for Pepsi, it's nothing less than I would expect from any other corporation, either. LJ is the one at fault here. IMO.

[firebird157.livejournal.com]

I don't think pepsi will give a shit, sorry, have you seen their sockpuppet journal pepsi2dmax? Especially this post?

I mean talk about offensive... of course some people reckon it's parody but I don't know... feels real to me.

[grey-hunter.livejournal.com]

I thik Pepsy already knows it - they most likely planned it like that, too. Because the fact you got it from another user makes it not their or 6A's fault it is there. Everything is allowed that isn't forbidden, right?