Good and Bad PR: Vegan Galaxy! Plastic-free Heineken! What’s not to like?

Good PR

Galaxy chocolate

I feel like I have dedicated a LOT of time over the past few weeks to discussing the introduction of vegan versions of food, but I couldn’t not mention this week’s exciting news that Mars will be launching a vegan range of Galaxy bars, with some seriously tempting flavours!

The plant-based alternative to traditional milk chocolate is a first from a mainstream confectioner, with the company taking more than six months to perfect the reformulated recipe. It will be released in caramelised hazelnut, caramel & sea salt and smooth orange – and in order to replace the dairy, developers have used such ingredients as hazelnut paste and rice syrup – YUM!

It has already been approved by the Vegan Society, and for those of you eager to get your hands on a bar before stocks sell out, it’ll be available online and in-store at Tesco, Ocado and Amazon from next Monday (18 November).

Heineken

Beer company Heineken has announced in the past week that it plans to remove all plastic wrapping and rings from multi-packs sold within the UK by the end of 2021 – just over two years away!

£22m has been invested into a new manufacturing process, and this will involve updating the Heineken factories’ machines and materials so that us beer lovers will soon be purchasing cans held together with cardboard toppers rather than the damaging rings so commonly associated with damaging wildlife and strangling birds.

F.R.I.E.N.D.S.

Guys, as a HUGE show of Friends, I am very excited.

It’s been rumoured ever since the original show went off air back in 2004, but news circulating this morning seems to suggest that everyone’s favourite American sitcom is making a return!

All six leading stars are apparently on board to take part in an unscripted reunion special, although insiders are quick to state that a finalised deal is far from agreed, with cast and creatives needing to iron more details out before any announcements are made.

Jennifer Aniston recently appeared on The Ellen Show and alluded to the fact that the group were ‘working on something’, so I’m just hoping they don’t let us all down!

Bad PR

Little Mix/PrettyLittleThing

The British girl band are in hot water this week after being accused of cultural appropriation and fetishising Asian women after the launch of their new clothing range for PrettyLittleThing.

The band openly described the collection as ‘Oriental’, but have been met with a barrage of criticism from the public since its launch on 6 November. Some of the pieces have been designed around a traditional Chinese dress called a quipao, made of silk with intricate embroidery and dating back to the 17th century.

Some took to social media to comment on their doubts surrounding the collection:

Whilst others have defended the band on Instagram and praised the collection as fashionable and cutting edge.

With their huge fanbase, it’s highly likely that the collection will be sold out in a matter of days, but this backlash can’t exactly feel great for either Little Mix or PrettyLittleThing.

Tesco

Now that we’re almost halfway through November, we are being bombarded with the onslaught of Christmas adverts from all the big-hitters (so excited for the John Lewis one this year just FYI!)

One non-festive advert released by Tesco during the last week has garnered all the negative press attention and backlash after featuring an image of Spice Girl Mel B, apparently without her permission.

The singer took to her Instagram to complain that the brand had used a throwback 90s’ image for an advert for its new Clubcard Plus, and demanded that CEO of the company, Dave Lewis, contact her immediately to resolve the situation.

Tesco representatives (not Dave Lewis though) responded by stating that it did indeed have full permission to use the image within its advertising material, but had subsequently made the decision to stop using it from Monday.

Mel B has since taken to Instagram and hinted that the whole thing was a huge PR stunt, stating that she took part in a campaign to raise money and awareness for Women’s Aid, and that Tesco has matched her donation to the charity, which will allow it to keep its live chat open for the next six months and over Christmas.

Is anyone else as confused as me about this?

Either way, there’s one thing that’s for damn sure. I still don’t have a bloody clue what Tesco Clubcard Plus is, or if I’d benefit from one.

Written by Lauren Wilden, head of PR at 10 Yetis Digital. Seen any good or bad PR lately? You know what to do @10Yetis on Twitter or andy@10Yetis.co.uk on email