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Chipotle Mexican Grill Wants Your Spam
by Karlene Lukovitz, Friday, June 25, 2010

No, it's not some kind of masochistic thing.

It's a clever social media- and Web advertising-driven campaign designed to generate donations for a nonprofit encouraging healthier, locally sourced school meals, while simultaneously reinforcing Chipotle Mexican Grill's message that fast food needn't be "junk" food.

The QSR's "No Junk" campaign, launching June 25, is asking people to forward their own junk emails to the chain (at nojunk@chipotlejunk.com).

For every 100,000 junk emails received (up to a 500,000 maximum), Chipotle will donate $10,000 to The Lunch Box, a new initiative from the F3: Food Family Farming Foundation that will offer 100,000 schools nationwide (32 million children) recipes and other tools for implementing healthy, whole foods-based, economical meal programs. The recipes are from F3 founder/"Renegade Lunch Lady" Ann Cooper, a chef and book author who, according to her bio, has made it her life's mission to advocate for better food for all children.

The "No Junk" campaign -- which will run through August (or until the maximum donation level is reached) -- ties in with Chipotle's "Food with Integrity" brand promise, based on its commitment to using premium-quality ingredients from sources that are more sustainable than any other national restaurant company, according to the chain.

For example, the 1,000-unit, nationwide chain uses meat from animals that are raised naturally (vegetarian diets with no hormones or antibiotics) and humanely, and dairy products from cows not treated with the synthetic hormone rBGH. Chipotle also continues to increase the amounts of locally/organically grown produce used in its restaurants.

The inspiration for the campaign was to convey Chipotle's desire to "help people to get junk out of their lives," Chris Arnold, the chain's public relations director, tells Marketing Daily. "Junk email is certainly one good example and, while we can't eliminate it from people's lives, we can at least help them put this negative to productive use."

To drive participation, Chipotle will run banner ads on targeted sites, as well as leverage Facebook.

The chain has created a "No Junk" tab on its Facebook page, which currently has about 750,000 fans. In addition to posting about the cause-related campaign, Chipotle is offering fans a "How Happy Are You?" game in which players' happiness levels go up when they "catch" a healthy Chipotle menu item or ingredient with a virtual fork, and go down when the item caught is "mass-produced junk food." Links encourage players to share the game with other social media users.

The brand will also get the word out via its Twitter presence, although that's not as robust as its Facebook fan base, says Arnold. Chipotle's Web site, due to being mid-redesign, won't promote the campaign, he says.

People who forward junk emails can rest assured that the content won't be read by Chipotle, and that the chain won't add their email addresses to its promotional database unless they opt in via a reply email triggered by their forwarding of junk email. The reply email will also point interested participants to Chipotle's site to learn more about its "Food with Integrity" promise/practices, and to TheLunchBox.org.

F3's stated mission is to help change the food system in the U.S. to an ecologically sound, sustainable model. The organization educates through training programs, direct services, a Web portal and collateral channels. In addition to Cooper, its founders include Chez Panisse Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Orfalea Foundations, the Colorado Health Foundation, the Compton Foundation and Whole Foods Market Inc.

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After years of chronicling the human experience as a senior writer for People, Susan Schindehette is using her storytelling skills to connect philanthropic efforts to the world's needy via her MiWorld portal.

Schindehette wants the newly launched site to humanize the links between large corporations and nonprofit organizations and the beneficiaries of their good deeds. Companies can highlight and leverage their altruism -- from providing school supplies, food and clothing to donating free shipping and transportation. MiWorld will augment the work of major news reporting and assistance agencies by injecting a human element into the process.

"As we've seen in a catastrophe of the magnitude in Haiti, individual human storytelling is still the best way to convey the reality of what's going on and stir action," Schindehette says.

"We want to let people from all around the world see and hear each other as individuals -- including the three to 5 billion people in the developing world whose names and compelling stories seldom appear in newspapers, magazines, television or the Internet," she says.

To remain viable, MiWorld is targeting paid advertising partnerships as its primary revenue stream. They will allow corporations to make their wholesale goods and services available for "one-click." Partners will benefit, she says, from direct sales revenue as well as a presence in emerging markets and favorable socially conscious brand positioning.

Cisco, Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, the VII Photo Agency, the Acumen Fund, the Skoll Foundation and the Gates Foundation have expressed initial interest in MiWorld, says Schindehette, who has been presenting her plans at various conferences, such as the Clinton Global Initiative.

Although she calls MiWorld a hybrid -- "not for MY profit" -- business model, it hopes to tap some of the $220 billion in annual charitable giving in the U.S. that has been strained by the economic recession. Schindehette is seeking $2.5 million in start-up funds from a philanthropic consortium and has outsourced MiWorld's IT operations to Blue State Digital, architects of candidate Obama's Internet fund-raising operation.

For now, MiWorld functions thanks to Schindehette, who has invested more than $50,000 of her own money to establish the MiWorld site as a story-driven interface between those who provide and receive assistance. It chronicles a trip that Schindehette and a team of volunteers made to Guatemala last year. Images were captured on site using MiWorld-branded Flip Mino digital recorders that work independent of any country's technical infrastructure.

Schindehette also has created modules using photos and text from friends demonstrating how MiWorld outreach would work in places such as Peru, Kenya and Pakistan.

Although the field of multimedia social outreach is getting crowded, she considers MiWorld's approach unique; a kind of global People online for the common good. Entertainer Bill Cosby and Northern Virginia philanthropist Earl Stafford recently announced a new Internet-based effort encouraging Americans to volunteer by showcasing good deeds. Volunteer and donation information is available on the Doing Good: The People's Project on The Stafford Foundation Web site.

"Haiti is going to be in trouble for a long time. Sooner or later, we'll see a wave of "disaster fatigue" on the part of the public. That's why we need MiWorld -- to present not just horrific stories of disaster, but to continue to tell remarkable stories of ordinary people who will somehow manage to survive and rebuild," she says.

"Imagine a fifth-grade class in the U.S. using MiWorld.com to partner on projects with a grade-school class in Africa or China. Imagine the power of bringing those people and their stories together, supported by organizations with the resources to help," adds Schindehette.

"It's our job to make the world a little smaller, one story at a time."

For more information visit www.mediapost.com