Hunger for Change
According to Sherman, Yum chose to partner with the WFP specifically because the organization has the ability to help leverage the company's size and scale to maximize its efforts. The WFP also can reach international communities in which Yum restaurants operate.
In the U.S., 36 million people don't have access to enough food. Worldwide, that number is about 1 billion.
"We're a global company," Sherman says. "We always say that our employee base, our marketing, and our philanthropic efforts need to mirror our company."
But hunger is a problem at home in the U.S., too. When Danny Bone, who owns a franchise location of the upscale burger concept Elevation Burger in Austin, Texas, heard about a hunger-relief program in his community, started by the Junior League of Austin, he decided to help.
Called Food in Tummies, or FIT, the program provides weekend meals for children attending the city's Baty Elementary School, 97 percent of whom are eligible for free or reduced-price weekday lunches through the National School Lunch Program. To ensure they don't go hungry when not in school, FIT sends the kids home with backpacks full of food on Fridays. Bone decided to help by donating 10 percent of his sales for a week this past November, promising to contribute no less than $2,500. He says part of the reason why he chose to donate to a hunger-related cause is that it was a local issue.
"I am a native of Austin," he says. "I've lived here all my life, and I always love to give back to the city. When you give back to Austin, it gives back to you."
Though Bone says it wasn't his primary reason for giving, he acknowledges that his effort to give back could reach the ears of potential customers. "I think there will be those who will notice that we are charitable and perhaps give us a try," he says.
Yet with the quick-serve segment often serving as the press’s whipping boy, one doesn't have to be much of a cynic to question whether these efforts aren't at least in part aimed at improving public relations. After all, many contributions by quick serves to hunger relief are hardly anonymous gifts.
For example, Dunkin' Brands' corporate employees and franchisees wore company T-shirts when they packed boxes for local food banks during a company-organized volunteer day, says public relations manager McCall Gosselin. And Yum’s World Hunger Relief efforts are often accompanied by press releases.
But hunger-relief organizations don’t feel exploited. "The best way the fast-food industry can help us is through cause-related marketing, joining forces with us to raise awareness of the pervasiveness of hunger in America," says Ross Fraser, media relations manager for Feeding America (formerly America's Second Harvest), the largest domestic hunger-relief charity in the U.S.
The publicity can work both ways, too. Share Our Strength, for instance, makes promotional materials available to chains and lists on its Web site restaurants that participate in the Great American Dine Out. Some restaurants also choose to participate in the event by selling coupons that can be redeemed at a later date, creating bounce-back visits.
"In addition to contributing to end child hunger, they can drive traffic, not just PR," Shore says.
Yum identified awareness raising, along with volunteer engagement and fundraising, among the three prongs of its World Hunger Relief campaign. Its initiatives include a Web portal and partnerships with high-profile spokespeople like singer Christina Aguilera and former NBA star Dikembe Mutombo. It's harnessing the power of social networking with campaigns like Pizza Hut's Re-Tweet 4 World Hunger Relief, an effort that invited the chain's Twitter followers to spread the word about the problem of hunger by sharing a link to the Pizza Hut World Hunger donation Web site. For each of the first 25,000 tweets, Pizza Hut donated four meals to the hungry. Yum restaurants also have materials promoting World Hunger Relief at the points of sale.
