Excerpted from Ethics Newsline ™
(www.globalethics.org/newsline/)
A publication of the Institute for Global Ethics

From the January 17, 2000, issue:

News: Retailing

BENETTON FEATURES DEATH-ROW INMATES IN CONTROVERSIAL NEW AD CAMPAIGN

Italian Clothing Firm Says It is Focusing Attention on Injustice; Critics Say Campaign is Exploitative

ROME
Italian clothing company Benetton last week unveiled a controversial new ad campaign featuring images and interviews with U.S. death-row inmates.

The ads, featuring 26 men on death row, are accompanied by short features and interviews with the prisoners, prepared over a two-year period by Benetton and creative director Oliviero Toscani.

Benetton, which has become known for its edgy and often politically charged advertising, insists the ads are intended to protest use of the death penalty in the United States. Capital punishment is banned in Italy and most other European nations.

"We will look back to this kind of justice one day and we will consider ourselves very primitive," Toscani told the Chicago Tribune.

But victims' families say that the Benetton's ads cross the line from hot-button advertising to crass and callous exploitation.

Responding to questions at the ads' New York unveiling, Benetton USA executive vice president Carlo Tunioli told reporters that "there's no correlation between these guys and our sweaters. In terms of an advertising strategy, what we are really doing is building brand awareness."

Whether that strategy pays off will be seen later this month, when Benetton's "We, On Death Row" campaign begins worldwide circulation, including a 100-page insert in the new magazine, Talk.

Sources: , Jan. 12 -- , Jan. 10 -- , Jan. 8.

For more information, see: , Jan. 10 -- Benetton page on new ads -- , Jan. 7.

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