Ben & Jerry's: The Product Is The Medium

I love Ben & Jerry's. The ice cream – sure – but now I'm talking about the brand. Ben & Jerry's just feels genuine in a way that few brands can even get close to. How do they do it? By having a congruent personality would be the simple, but all inclusive answer. The link between feeling genuine and being congruent is as true for brands as it is for people.

In being congruent, they've always used their product as their communications tool, and they use it to display their preferences, likes, and dislikes about different things. An example of this is their flavor Cherry Garcia. Created in 1987, it is a tribute to Grateful Dead singer and lead guitarist Jerry Garcia. Following the musician's death in 1995, the Cherry Garcia variety was made with black rather than the usual red cherries to show mourning for a month.

Likewise, in a show of appreciation of another of their favorite bands Phish, Ben & Jerry's created Phish Food, an absolute orgie in marshmallow, caramel, and fudge.

Ben & Jerry's have also pretty much set the standard for CSR. I won't go through all initiatives they have been involved in, but they all have in common that they feel genuine. We can look at one example that recently surfaced on Swedish ice cream shelves. "Baked Alaska" is the name of the new flavor, sporting the tagline "if it's melted, it's ruined". Alaska, having some of the worlds most rapidly vanishing glaciers, is the focal point for this product/campaign (note that these are inseparable). Global warming as a whole is of course the more general focus. Each tub of ice cream sold brings in funds to Ben & Jerry's climate change college (check out this link), which in turn brings attention to the issue.

They even have white chocolate polar bears in the ice cream. How cute is that!

Note how they are not trying to be scary or negative, but rather use humor and a positive tone. And that's how you engage people. It's also of course in complete alignment with the Ben & Jerry's brand.

This is the holy grail of using your product to communicate. It's just so well executed I want to cry.