Benedict Advertising - Business Building Solutions

by Donna Cooper, Jr. Copywriter

It’s always nice when a multi-billion dollar company decides to do something good for humanity. This week’s company is none other than the most wholesome company on the planet, The Walt Disney Company. It’s not surprising considering that Disney’s target demographic is under the age of 12, then that they have declared that they will remove all images from all future endeavors that directly market to children and to “wag their corporate fingers” at the use of cigarettes in their more adult ventures with Miramax and Touchstone films.

In a move that seems aimed to please Congress, Disney announced that not only would it be banning smoking in films that are targeted toward children, but also it would require warnings and showing anti-smoking PSA’s before movies and on DVD’s. It isn’t the first time, Disney has “stepped-up” to the plate for causes that are in the best interest of children. Last fall Disney snapped up the Child Obesity cause by creating policies that called for Disney to use it’s name and character only on kid-focused products that meet specific guidelines. Disney also said that it would be eliminating added trans fat from food served at its parks by the end of 2007 and from licensed and promotional products by the end of 2008.

Talk about being a socially responsible corporation. If more companies participated in socially responsible business practices, this world would be a much better place. But as it stands, very few companies make a concerted effort to change the world. Don’t get me wrong; they do their share for the communities that they operate it. But for companies like Disney, or Johnson & Johnson, they could do so much more. The amount of money they could dump into causes that reach more than just a few thousand people is unfathomable.

Think of how many kids go to Disney Parks a year, buy Disney products, or watch the Disney Channel. For Disney to be taking such a huge step forward in being socially responsible and looking out for their target markets best interests, I applaud them. Large or Small, companies across the globe should have nothing but the best interest of their clients in mind. And those who do what they can for their consumers, clients, and communities are top notch in my book.

Wonder what cause Disney will scoop up next? They’ve already freed Willy and found Nemo.

This entry was posted on Friday, July 27th, 2007 at 3:12 pm and is filed under What's the 411?. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.