Pressure groups: no legal power, so they work through your customers

1. A pressure group is not a regulator and owns no part of the business, so it cannot fine a firm, cancel its contracts or order it to stop.
2. Its power is borrowed from other people, because every method it uses is aimed at the customers who decide whether to keep buying, the journalists who repeat the story and the MPs who write the law.
   1. Publicity and social media: one video or hashtag reaches millions of shoppers in days and costs the group almost nothing to send.
   2. Petitions and protests: a signature count gives journalists a number and a demonstration outside a shop or head office gives them a picture, which is what keeps a story running.
   3. Boycotts: this is the only method that shows up in the accounts straight away, because refusing to buy cuts revenue in the week it happens.
   4. Lobbying: pressing the government for tougher rules changes the whole industry at once, so no rival gains an advantage by refusing to follow.

Why a business responds when nothing forces it to

1. Criticism now reaches customers directly rather than through a newspaper that might not print it, so a firm can lose control of what its brand means in a single weekend.
2. Follow the chain: shoppers see the campaign, some switch to a rival, revenue falls, and the advertising needed to win those customers back costs more than reformulating the product would have cost in the first place.
3. The firms with most to lose are those charging a premium on brand image, because a customer paying more for Nike or Innocent is paying for how the brand makes them feel, so an attack on the image is an attack on the price.

The effect on each element of the marketing mix

1. A campaign usually names one element, but a response that holds up moves all four, and each move carries its own cost.
2. Product: the firm reformulates or redesigns, removing the material or ingredient the campaign named, switching packaging to recyclable card, or adding a plant-based or cruelty-free range alongside the original.
   1. Adding a range rather than replacing the old product answers the criticism without losing the customers who still buy the original.
3. Price: sustainable materials and fairly paid suppliers raise the cost of every unit, so the business has to decide whether to pass that cost on or absorb it.
   1. Passing it on protects profit per unit but sends price-sensitive shoppers to a cheaper rival, while absorbing it holds the price and the sales volume but leaves less profit on each item sold.
4. Promotion: the business advertises its ethical credentials to answer the criticism, putting the recycled packaging or the new sourcing rule at the centre of the message.
   1. Every claim has to be accurate and provable, because a group that finds an exaggeration will publicise it and the advert itself becomes the next story.
5. Place: the firm changes where it buys and how goods travel, dropping a supplier accused of poor conditions, shortening delivery routes to cut emissions, or pulling out of a country entirely.
   1. Finding and approving a new supplier takes months and often costs more per unit, so place is the slowest element to move and the one customers notice last.

Responding badly costs more than not responding

1. A change to the advertising that is not matched by a change in the factory is found quickly, because campaigners check the supply chain rather than the slogan.
2. The business then faces two stories instead of one, the original issue and the accusation that it tried to cover the issue up, and the second is harder to answer because it is about honesty.
3. A change that is real but small is still worth making, provided the promotion describes it exactly, since a firm claiming one recyclable box is safer than a firm claiming to be green.