Chicken Republic, a quick service restaurant, has provoked the social media community by using the travails of the National Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Olisa Metuh, to market its brand. The advert, one that went unnoticed out of several, is being questioned on ethical ground by social media commentators and brand analysts, writes ADEDEJI ADEMIGBUJI.
No one, perhaps, only a few, took the brand, Chicken Republic, a quick service restaurant, up on its series of advertising campaigns on social and political gaffes in the last one year, until the recent one. In a recent campaign that is generating a fuss, in the brands and marketing community, as well as the social media, the company used the travail of the National Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Olisa Metuh, to create what some described as a mockery or satirical social media campaign.
The controversy was inspired by the arrest of Metuh on allegation of corruption. Few days after his arrest, he was reportedly on hunger strike. Days later, when he was brought to the court, Facebook and Twitter in Nigeria almost collapsed under the weight of narratives about whether or not, it was right for the government to have brought him to court on handcuffs. Metuh was also rumoured to have attempted to “chew” his written statement, an issue that made the EFCC to level other separate charges of trying to destroy evidence against him.
In the midst of his travail, Chicken Republic’s creative agency, BBDO, was inspired to create content; a cartoon where Chicken Republic was asking the rather funny question- why eat your words when you can eat our chicken? In the cartoon, a Chicken Republic “chicken” is seen flying to deliver a special food order for Metuh while he was in EFCC custody.
Following the release of the creative material on social media, its audience who were unhappy with the way Metuh is being treated, vent their anger against the QSR on Facebook and twitter, calling for the boycott of the QSR on account of this. ”Those who were piloting this ship even went as far as creating their own cartoons, some of which had pictures of people vomiting after eating at Chicken Republic,” says Brand-Analyst-Chief at Brandish.com.ng.
That’s not the first of such controversial ad from the brand. The Nation sighted other social issue ads on Chicken Republic twitter @ChickenRepublic playing on some of the happenings in the country in the last one year. Some of the social media ads include: No More Black Friday Discount for Petrol on November 7; On appointment of Babatunde Fashola: Yoruba Dictionary, Okunrin meta ‘3-in-1 BRF’. The brand also used another one on Buhari with a campaign theme-Baba-Go-Fast and several hashtags on: þ@ChickenRepublic 8 Oct 2015 #UsainBuhari #PickingUpSpeed #BoltOfChange #HopeFortheFuture #BetterThingsToCome #ChickenRepublic. On March 21, the brand also used a cartoon with an theme: How to Woo Electorate. These are some of the social critic campaign from the QSR.
Also, Chicken Republic has done another ridiculing of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) as well as former Chelsea Manager, Jose Mourinho.
But the take on Metuh has generated much furore from social media audience believed to be his sympathisers. This according to some, could affect the market of the brand, especially in the areas that have soft spot for him. On the other hand, the some analysts believe it could further strengthen the brand instead.
“You see, what these angry people were doing are exactly what Chicken Republic desired. The brand wanted conversations. ‘Let the people be talking about us,’ must have been the message to the agency behind the campaign. Chicken Republic is easily country’s biggest, operating 65 outlets in Nigeria and Ghana and looking like it is the only indigenous quick service restaurant that still makes money. In these days when traditional advertising really no longer works and folks are playing more in the content space, Chicken Republic seemed to have caught the bug quicker than most other players in and outside the QSR industry,” said Okuhu.
He said to provoke conversations and generate viral buzz, Chicken Republic has chosen the very controversial, as themes for its content, designed mainly in the form of cartoons with real people, with real emotional arteries running through millions of individuals as subjects.
“Its latest focus was Olisa Metuh and for a couple of days, it seemed like this was a wrong choice for this company that has clearly innovated better than the rest of the industry, especially the locals. Emotions ran wild, especially among those who are Metuh’s fans and supporters. And it worked!,” he said.
“In less than 48 hours after the content was released, hundreds of thousands have shared it on Facebook. Countless others who are angry created their own messages and even called for boycotts. But nobody ever boycotted a business for doing such things. Chicken Republic seems to have understood social media even better than those who use it every day to share content and be up-to-date on news and information. They know that “sharing” is at the core of why we are on the social media. They also are aware that the more a particular content is shared, the more people talked about it and the higher they go in terms of top-of-mind,” said Okuhu.
He said little wonder the brand has grown from $2 million at launch back in the early 2000s to over $150 million today. Okuhu affirms further: “A brand that prides itself as one for the young must firmly understand what drives this community and controversy is one of them.”
Another commentator, Kelechi Deca in one of his comments on the controversial cartoon, said Chicken Republic will profit rather than lose at the end of the day. “Instead of boycott, more people will throng the restaurants for even more chicken,” he noted. He added, “Not all demarkating actually ends up demarkating a brand. It might lead to the emergence of another crop of supporters …”
It will be recalled that few months ago, StanbicIBTC also mocked English Premier League side, Arsenal, on twitter after its goalkeeper let in cheap goals in the first game of the season against West Ham United.
“As we said in a review of that campaign, especially when Arsenal fans were raving and ranting all over the place, the winner at the end of the day would be Stanbic IBTC. We had then made it clear that “content is critical to marketing these days. When you have the right content, what it does for the brand is to breed a sense of community via social conversations. Content has come to replace the old-reliable word-of-mouth communication and tends to be a lot more effective because it has a way of bringing a lot more people together,” Okuhu recalled.
Whether the ad is in bad taste or not, there is a consensus among brand analysts that Chicken Republic has won yet again. “For the people on the side of Metuh, they have inadvertently spread the word on the brand, even with their boycott calls,” said Okuhu.
