Be Excellent To Each Other

So, Paperchase ran a campaign in the Daily Mail this weekend whereby readers could get free wrapping paper.

Now, I love Paperchase because it’s where unicorns go to party, and where, if I needed 200 differently shaped pencil erasers I know I’d be allllreeet. It’s also where I buy my Christmas cards from every year because I LOVE the charities they support, and every card in a box is for a different charity and you can read a couple of paragraphs about the work each charity does as you write your cards, and I love that.

Anyway, so Paperchase makes me happy and the Daily Mail makes me really, really unhappy, so it’s disappointing to see them run the campaign via that newspaper.

The Stop Funding Hate campaign has called them out on it and Paperchase have issued this apology.

However, as you can see in the replies, a lot of people have criticised this as a spineless move. The obvious thing is not to have run a promotion with them to start with... perhaps more visible a collaboration than just advertising, I’d think. But that horse has bolted, now, so what do you think their best move would have been after the event? I can’t help but see they are onto a lose/lose.

I’d like to see the paper fold (hah), so I am not sorry to hear that a store I like have said this, but I don’t know what’s the best business decision here so wondered what cleverer people think.

TBH I see it as a store for people like me, and people like me don’t like the Mail, we like unicorns and rainbows.

The top 3 papers (based on circulation) are the Sun, the Mail and the Mirror (if you leave out London only papers)

So doubt the Mail will go away anytime soon

BA where getting pressure as they provided free copies of the Mail on flights, they responsed by keeping the Mail and adding the Sun

Its political correctness gone mad.

I fully believe that people should have the right to read whatever newspaper they like.

I've got the right to fucking judge them, though.

I audibly groaned when someone on the train started reading The Mail last week. Vocalised disapproval! On the train! It might as well have punched them in the face.

Oh goodness, I completely agree. I also think businesses should have the *right* to advertise in whichever papers they choose, but it’s not so much about rights in this case as what is the intelligent business decision?

I suppose you almost have to take a step back and make a judgement in if your customers are more likely to be Mail (etc) readers, or people who will applaud you for taking a moral stand against those papers, in which case you are making a judgement on the moral beliefs (and possibly class, wealth, other background factors) of the more major part of your client/customer base.

I do, however, think the Mail doesn't have the right to print some of the things it prints.