The Triple Bottom Line Blog

If you keep tabs on media coverage of the environment, you may have heard about the recent about-face at The New Republic regarding its new blog focusing on energy and the environment. When the blog was first launched a week and a half ago, it bore the logo and message, "Powered by BP," representing sponsorship by the somewhat controversial UK oil company. It was the only portion of the magazine's website to bear such a logo (though advertising not linked to any particular magazine feature does appear elsewhere on the site).

Readers protested, the blog's chief writer wrote a post explaining his own discomfort with the sponsorship, and within hours the other shoe dropped. The following note appeared on the blog:

You may notice that this blog looks a little different. The phrase "powered by BP," which appeared in the banner when we launched yesterday, led to some (justifiable) confusion about the blog's relationship with BP. But TNR's agreement with BP was and is purely an advertising deal, and the company never had any say in our editorial content. Today, the TNR business staff and BP decided to remove their logo placement to make sure that relationship is clear.

It's an interesting story that illustrates yet again the great and growing power of grassroots stakeholders--in this case, the readers of The New Republic--to force companies to back down from policies or practices of which they don't approve.

What I find most interesting, however, is the reason those readers objected to the BP sponsorship. It wasn't, apparently, any fear that BP would be dictating or influencing the content of the blog. Writer Bradford Plumer had addressed this issue in his post expressing concerns about the relationship, titled with disarming frankness, "Are We in the Tank?" His answer, obviously, was no--and judging by the comments he received, most readers accepted it.

No, what bothered the readers was the possible impact of the sponsorship on BP itself. As a commenter known as Nippers wrote:

The danger for T[he] N[ew] R[epublic] is not so much that BP will influence its writers as that TNR will lend BP integrity and eco-cred. Running BP ads would be one thing. But pinning that little petrochemical boutonniere to the web site's lapel--well, it's a mistake the magazine would do well to reconsider.

In other words, readers of The New Republic for whom the magazine's reputation is important were upset with the idea that that reputation would provide a little borrowed luster to an oil company.

Imagine--a group of customers who care more about the halo effect of the company's reputation than the company itself does! And one that pays close enough attention to the behavior of firms in other industries (like energy) to consider itself capable of judging which companies are and are not suitable business associates for a magazine they respect.

Now that's what you call an active, involved set of stakeholders. The New Republic did the right thing by reversing the sponsorship plan so quickly. If you're lucky enough to attract customers who care that much about what you do, you'd better treat them with respect--as the business partners they are.

Labels: BP, Communications and Marketing, New Republic