The refugee crisis in Europe has prompted some brands to take a stance, despite the potential risks.
No doubt you’ve seen the movie Casablanca. (If you haven’t, you really should.) The film was already timeless, but suddenly it looks timely too. Many of the characters are refugees, turfed out of their homes by war and marooned in the titular city as they seek visas that will enable them to get to neutral Lisbon – and from there to “the new world”.
Although they look shabby and lost, they seem to have a rather better time of it than the Syrian (and other) refugees currently straggling across Europe. After all, the plot demands that they spend most of the movie hanging out at Rick’s Café, a glamorous dive run by Humphrey Bogart.
The refugees in Casablanca interact with three different types of people. Those who manipulate them for profit – such as the corrupt police chief Louis Renault and the shady black market dealer Signor Ugarte (an indelible Peter Lorre); those who help them and are covered in glory as a result – like the heroic but stuffy resistance leader Victor Laszlo; and those who work behind the scenes but expect nothing in return – Rick himself, who hides his true nature beneath a cynical shell.
Today’s refugees must negotiate a similar emotional landscape. It’s fairly obvious who the biggest profiteers are: the people traffickers who convey the refugees across land and sea for vast sums in unsuitable and sometimes lethal forms of transport. The aid organizations and civilian volunteers are their polar opposites.
But the refugee trail has also created a complex ecosystem in which brands have found their place, adopting postures that could be compared to those of Victor Laszlo and Rick.
Google has been one of the most high-profile benefactors, with a donation-matching campaign that has raised US$11 million. More recently, it has launched a “crisis info hub” that will provide refugees with information on transport and lodging. The hub will be accessible through smartphones.
The very fact that many of the refugees own smartphones has provoked raised eyebrows among the anti-migrant brigade, but it’s logical for two reasons; firstly, such phones have plummeted in price over the last couple of years and, secondly, many refugees come from comfortable middle class homes. They are like the rest of us, except they got caught up in a war.
Talking of homes, IKEA rather brilliantly dipped into its brand DNA to design flat-packed units that assemble into solar-powered dwellings, in association with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). They may not be houses, but they’re not tents.
In September, Uber offered to send cars free of charge to pick up donated items and transport them to distribution points. Called UberGiving, the operation covered 23 cities across Europe.
TripAdvisor has set up its own donation-matching scheme – it will match donations of up to US$5000 per person – and granted staff five days of paid leave to volunteer at any nonprofit organization that is helping refugees.
And these are just the Victor Laszlo brands, if you accept my tenuous metaphor. Their efforts are laudable, but also, not coincidentally, in tune with their brand values. Many other companies are no doubt helping quietly behind the scenes.
It’s arguable that any brand visibly aligning itself with the refugee cause is demonstrating a level of courage. Unlike an earthquake or a hurricane, the refugee crisis is politically charged. For every European who wants to help the refugees, there is another who sees them as Muslim interlopers, poised at the very least to steal jobs and spread their religion, if not actually commit terrorist atrocities. To help the refugees may alienate a certain number of customers. Not customers you’d invite round for a drink, maybe – but profits are profits.
A number of brands recently found themselves benefiting from the refugee crisis in an ironic and backhanded way. In Catania, Sicily, refugees fresh off the boat found themselves queuing to receive free sneakers bearing the logos of Nike, Puma and Adidas, among others. The twist? The sneakers were all fakes, confiscated from sellers of counterfeit goods at the local market. Instead of destroying them, the police donated them to a local aid group.
So while some brands may be ambivalent about the refugees, the sportswear giants are implicated whether they like it or not.
This article was first published in the November-December 2015 issue of adobo magazine.
