Ep136: How Columbia Sportswear is Using Cause Marketing to Blaze a New Trail
Today on CauseTalk Radio, Megan and I talk to Scott Welch, Global Corporate Relations Manager, at Columbia Sportswear Company about their national cause marketing program with the National Park Foundation called Find Your Park.
Megan, Scott and I discuss:
Scott Welch, Columbia Sportswear
- Columbia Sportswear's deep commitment to cause marketing. They know that people wear their brand over their hearts and want that to mean something to customers.
- With an aging consumer base with little diversity, Columbia realized that cause marketing could help them connect with Millennials of all backgrounds.
- In 2013, Columbia Sportswear, REI and National Park Foundation teamed up for Find Your Park, which took Latino bloggers on a week-long excursion to a national park. The result: 60 million media impressions!
- In 2015, Find Your Park will take a group of multicultural Millennials to Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado.
- The challenge of doing cause marketing when you are a business-to-business and have to work through retails partners, like REI, to tell your story.
- Other programs Columbia supports, like Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and what they do to stand out from their competitors and communicate their support to consumers.
- Columbia's success with action-triggered donation campaigns to promote their footwear line and raise $25,000 for two charity partners.
- What Columbia Sportswear has learned from Patagonia - and what we can learn about Columbia from comparing the two!
- How Columbia engages its employees in cause programs - and the challenge of supporting a global workforce.
