Nike is undoubtedly one of the biggest companies when it comes to sportswear and sports brands. Known for their sports footwear, clothes and accessories, The ad was plastered on billboards all over America with the tag line “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything”. The line being a nod to Kaepernick’s previous actions of not standing for the national anthem in protest over the treatment of ethnic minorities.The Problem: After Kaepernick refused to stand for the national anthem, many viewers became angry at him and viewed him as anti-American. The fact that Nike was using him in their ads made many people believe Nike was also anti-American. This sparked a lot of controversies online with many social media users destroying their Nike products while posting the hashtag #JustBurnIt.
LUSH is a UK based handmade cosmetics manufacturer that has stores all across the UK and USA. In 2018 LUSH released their spy cops campaign across all their UK stores which raised many eyebrows.The Problem: The main issue with this campaign is that it came across as very anti-police to most of the general public. In fact, there were reports of people complaining and becoming very aggressive in the stores, resulting in LUSH having to call the police. Due to the negative reception of the ads.
Nivea is a German skincare brand that is known for manufacturing antiperspirants, face creams, and plenty of other cosmetics. To promote one of their new invisible antiperspirants, Nivea decided to use the tagline “white is purity” on their social media campaign. The ad featured a woman wearing a white top while looking out the window with the slogan in bold blue letters.The Problem: As you can probably see from the advert above, the choice of words for this campaign were very poorly chosen. To make things worse, they specifically aimed the campaign at people in the Middle East which caused many people to call the advert racist.
H&M landed in hot water at the start of the year, when it featured an ad with a black child wearing a hoodie bearing the slogan “coolest monkey in the jungle.” The image went viral, and was slammed on social media, including by The Weekend, who announced on Twitter that he would no longer be affiliated with the brand. H&M later apologized.
