The Mill{shal{e
ly picked pasta, considering it easier to
That's Half Empty
HERE'S a drarnatic scene in the movie 77",," WUl Be Blood in which
T the misanthropic tycoon Daniel Plainview describes to preacher
Eli Sunday how Plainview used his drilling rigs-clandes-
tinely positioned on adjacent land-to siphon off the churchman's oil:
"If you have a milkshake, and I have
a milkshake, and I have a straw ... My
straw reaches across the room, and stans
to drink your milkshake ... I-Drink-
Your-Milkslwlle!'
Already, that phrase seems well on its
way to joining the American colloquial
phrase book. But some weeks ago (and
before Daniel Day'Lewis snared an Oscar
for his rendition of these lines and others),
I listened to those words while sitting in the
darkness of a movie theater and my mind
wandered away from the gritty image!)'
drawn from Upton Sinclair's novel Oil! to
reflect on my career in the advertising busi-
ness. Then it hit me: I've seen this milk-
shake-siphoning going on for 25 years.
I speak of the longstanding relation-
ship between advertisers and advertising
agencies and the African American con'
sumers they're attempting to reach. Too
often, the marketing budgets earmarked
for consumers ofcolor are woefully inad-
equate, as is the time, energy and
resources devoted to examining and
understanding thcm. There's a simple rea-
RANDOM THOUGHTS /Iv PCler \1udler
16 .IIIWIII' MAllCH 10, :zoos
son for that: Something's
had a big drink of their milk·
shake. So-called mainstream
marketing has slurped up
too much of the money and
resources nccessa!)' to study,
and then effectively commu·
nicate with, African Ameri-
can consumers. The result is
that brands fail to deliver
their messages and build By Larry
their equity with this popu-
lation due to lack ofaccurate
research and data, inade· Companies
quate media expenditures that won't
and a weak commitment to
the idea of racial·minority commit
marketing in general.
As I sat musing in my the-
consumers of
ater seat, I also remembered color can't
a client I had a few years ago expect
who was a major Internet
service provider. My firm reach them.
had completed a pilot pro-
gram engineered to reach and convert
African American consumers to the
online service for about Il(lljofwhat it
would COSt to convert people using the
mainstream media. My suggestion was
that the company acquire all orthe low·
COSt consumers it could first, then reach
out to the customers whose conversion
COSt would be higher.
It was then that the unfortunate milk-
shake maxim kicked in. The company's
budget for consumers ofcolor, I was told,
was only a million dollars. So, using the
client's logic, the company would get a
million dollars of African American con-
sumers and, after that, spend the balance
of their budget paying more to acquire
each new customer.
Then I thought about another client.
The company sold rice, a business dedin-
iog as non-ethnic consumers increasing-
prepare. I'd proposed a broad-scale cam-
paign aimed at the elll;rt population,
themed with thc growing popularity of
ethnic cuisine. But the client demurred,
refusing to abandon his "core customer."
Both of these companies made costly
marketing mistakes because (hey were fol·
lowing outmoded, blanket approaches to
ethnic marketing and failed to understand
the complexities of their target demo-
graphic. Both had a soft spot
on their brains when it came
to applying simple profit log-
ic to black consumers.
I write these words on the
heels orche Eisenhower Foun-
dation's update of the Kuner
Refxnt, the Federal study
released 40 years ago that
famously documented a coun-
try Wmoving toward two soci-
eties-one black, one white-
Woodard separate and unequal. ~ We
find many of the same ills per-
vading the African American
community today as we did
four decades ago. Among
them: Theunemployment rate
to of African Americans contin-
ues to be roughly twia that of
Caucasians and there's evi·
dence that employers ~steer~
to even highly skilled minority
applicants into low-level jobs.
If we were to take the
advertising business as a
microcosm of society, we do not see this
picture improve by much: Discrimination
continues to be a blemish on the indust!)',
and minority interns tend toexit the adver·
tising indust!), early for career fields that
promise more opportunity.
Given this picture, is it any wonder that
the ad business has not yet achieved the
complexion of a two·shot latte at Star·
bucks? I urge clients and agencies eve!)'-
where to challenge the status quo and
commit to becoming more educated,
aware and active. It's time that minority
marketing gets its milkshake-and gets to
drink it.
Larry Woodard is pmldenl and chief strategy oJJi·
ft'ral ad IIgent)' Vigilante in New York. He {lin bf
relldled lit (112) 444-6050 QI' Iarry.woodard@
vlgilanlen)(".rorIl.
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