Fundraising and Marketing Charity Marketing Practice of Wetherspoon

Introduction

Take a partnership with charities is one of most popular way to practice public relations. Today, there are numbers of businesses associating themselves with charity organizations to market their businesses. Affiliating with charities is a primary method for developing and improving strong network for businesses. It is important for companies to create and send out the right image of the firms as this will affect how people perceive and feel toward organizations (Burnett 2002, p. 13).
This study will use Wetherspoon as the case study to demonstrate the understanding of marketing and fundraising, quality and operation theory and concepts. Wetherspoon is current supporting CLIC Sargent, which is the UK’s leading children’s cancer charity. CLIC Sargent specializes in three areas of activity – medical resources, practical help and research (Wetherspoon 2006). Up to date, Wetherspoon contributes times and means to help raising funds of £1,523,285.90 (Wetherspoon 2006). The aim of this paper is to provide the understanding of the theory and practice of marketing and fundraising in an organization

Definition of Marketing and Charity Marketing

When mentioning about marketing, most people will think about selling. However, marketing has more complicated meaning. According to Sargeant (1999, p. 29), he defined marketing as:
“Marketing is a way of fitting together the planning and implementation of goods, services or ideas in a practical but sophisticated way and in the way that emphasizes the needs of customers rather than trying to improve efficiency of existing process” (Sargeant 1999, p. 29)
The American Marketing Association defined the meaning of marketing as:
“Marketing is the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion and distribution of idea, goods and services to create exchange that satisfy individuals and organizational goals” (Kotler 2005, p. 9)
According to these concepts of marketing, it can be assumed that both marketing is an activity to help companies to reach its objectives and goals by delivering customer value and providing customer satisfaction (McLeish 1995, p. 8-9). This assumption should restore confidence of the charity customers as it explains the important role of the companies. People normally see marketing as the process in which companies selling products or services that customers do not need (McLeish 1995, p. 15). This can be assumed that companies that affiliate with charity, the effectiveness of marketing activities will depend on the public relations (Bonk et al 1999, p. 12). The following sections will examine the (a) effectiveness of the marketing of the products and service of Wetherspoon, which associate with the CLIC Sargent and (b) then discuss the impact of the charity marketing activities of Wetherspoon have on the fundraising for the organization.

(A) The Effectiveness of Wetherspoon’ Charity Marketing Activity

In order to achieve the company’ goals, it has to build a marketing program or plan. This is called marketing mix, which is a set of marketing tools that the firms use to achieve its marketing objectives and goals in the target market (McLeish 1995, p. 18-19). Marketing program consists of four main ingredients, which are price, place, product and promotion – the 4P’s. Sometimes it can be 7P’s with the addition of people, psychical evidence and process (D’Esopo & Almquist 2007, p. 122-131).
The Charity Marketing Mix of Wetherspoon
Charity marketing consists of the same ingredients – products, price, place and promotion which are made to influence the trade channels and the final consumers (Sargeant 1999, p. 14-15). In the context of charity marketing, there are three extra ingredients. The three elements are including people, psychical evidence and process (Bruce 2005, p. 60). In this section, the analysis of charity marketing mix of Wetherspoon will be examined.
Product
Products can be referred to brand, product variety, quality, design, features, variety, packaging, size, returns, warranties, service, support and guarantee (Sargeant 1999, p. 14). Products can be in both intangible and tangible forms. In the case of Wetherspoon, it offers both types – products and services. Wetherspoon provides cheap quality food and drink and excellent customer services to people of all age. It also has children food menu, which just won the best children menu award. Some of the money earning form selling kid meals will be donated to the CLIC Sargent.
Price
Wetherspoon uses low pricing and odd-pricing strategies for all of its food and drink (Liang & Kanetkar 2006, p. 377-385). This influences and encourages the costumers of Wetherspoon to donate money in the pink charity box of CLIC Sargent (Sargeant 1999, p. 15). However, the price may differ depending on the area of the outlets.
Promotion
Promotion mix also comprises of different elements. The promotion mix includes sales promotion, advertising, sales force, public relations and direct marketing. The promotion strategy of Wetherspoon is the most effective and successful approaches behind the growth of the company (McLeish 1995, p. 19). Wetherspoon practices sales promotion, in-house advertising, direct marketing and print media and effective public relations. According to the in-depth interview with the Wetherspoon pub manager in Leister Square, which one of the busiest outlets, she said that Wetherspoon offers a lot of sales promotion. For example, Wetherspoon provides Monday Club and Roast Club (Sunday).
Place
The ingredients of place mix consist of distribution channel, coverage, assortments, locations, inventory and transport (Bruce 2005, p. 93). In the case of Wetherspoon, its outlets are located in the easy access for the publics. The decoration and interior design of the outlet are presentable. According to numbers of studies, it shown that the appearance of the facilities of the companies can increase and decrease the trust of customers toward the charity marketing activities (Harwood & Garry 2006, p. 107-111).
Form the above explanation of the marketing charity concepts through the example of Wetherspoon, it can be concluded that the first 4Ps in marketing is focused heavily towards physical goods rather than services. Also, the first 4Ps is constructed with no references to fundraising and charity activities within companies and voluntary organizations. Consequently, the extra four Ps including people, psychical evidence process and philosophy are added to the charity marketing activity (Bruce 2005, p. 60-61).
People
Bruce (2005, p. 61) referred people to the personnel and their training, commitment, appearance, attitudes, appearance, degree of involvement and customer-to-customer interaction. People element is very important for the charity marketing. This is because it has an affect on the customer assessment (Wise and Sirohi 2006, p. 10-11). There are two groups under the element of people. The two groups are personnel of service and other customers (McLeish 1995, p. 24). The personnel of services are important in the customer assessment. They can affect on maintaining and retaining customers. If the customers are happy with the services, they may recommend them to friends and families or they may come back again for the services (Sargeant 1999, p. 29). This means that Wetherspoon’ personnel must be well-trained, have good manner and deliver high level of customer value and satisfaction. The staffs must be able to answer the simple questions of customers in order to gain the positive image and trust. Many studies revealed to do this effectively, the personnel must work extra miles to achieve high customer value and satisfaction (Torres & Kline 2006, p. 290-301). For example, Wetherspoon floor staffs should offer the customer with high chairs before the customers asking for one if they come with young children.
Physical Evidence
Bruce (2005, p. 63) referred physical evidence to visible things that are surrounding the customers before they decide to use the services. For example, physical evidence includes the cleanliness, decoration, and modernity of the buildings. According to the interview with the pub manager, she stated that Wetherspoon takes physical very serious. Wetherspoon has the program called ‘CQSMA’ stands for cleanliness, quality, service, maintenance and assessment. This program is important to the monthly bonus to influence all members of the staff to put the program in practice effectively (Lui 2006, p. 30-37). For example, twice a week there will be a mystery customer from the head office to visit each outlet.
Process
According to McLeish (1995, p. 25), the process is the list of activities, which include fundamental to successful service products. For example, Wetherspoon make it easy for the customers to make the donation by providing the CLIC charity boxes next too all of the tills in each outlet. Wetherspoon website also provides the full information of CLIC Sargent and the section that allows the online users to make donation along with the full information of taxation, term and condition. There is also a link from Wetherspoon website that can take online visitors to the main webpage of CLIC Sargent (Sargeant 1999, p. 42). This is shown in Figure 1.
Philosophy
Bruce (2005, p. 65) stated that philosophy is a clear recognition of the value-laden fashion to be taken or expected in the products, services or ideas aimed at the target markets. McLeish (1995, p. 27) claimed that the companies that associate with marketing charity activities should be clear about their value and philosophy and ensure that these elements are included into the marketing mix in the clear and understood way. Wetherspoon’s organizational philosophy is to show that little money can bring customer great value. Therefore, products and services have to be judged in the same way. It fundraising activities such as selling key-chain and raising funds for CLIC Sargent will also be looked in this light in which the little money as low as a penny can make a different for children with cancer (Wetherspoon 2006).
The following figure (Figure 2) features the marketing mix of charity marketing and the charity marketing framework and tools.

(B) The Impact of the Marketing Activities of Wetherspoon on Fundraising for the organization

This section will discuss the impact of marketing activities to the fundraising for the organization. The recommendation will also be produced.
Charity Identity: Trust and Confidence
Charity identity is important in commercial world as brand equity is the financial value and the brand is based on the factors of loyalty, awareness, perceived quality, strong brand association, communication and distribution channels (Simms & Trott 2006, p. 228-238). This is also true for the charity marketing perspective as it relate to trust and confidence (Burnett 2002, p. 37). As Wetherspoon is not a charity organization, but it helps raising funds for the children cancer charity. Some of the sales of Wetherspoon’ kid meals will be donated to CLIC Sargent. The perceived identity of Wetherspoon as the representative of CLIC Sargent is quite negative because customers perceive its brand as commercial trader and the donation will not reach the persons in needs. This perceived identity that customers have toward Wetherspoon can decrease the level of fundraising of the charity (McLeish 1995, p. 33). There are a few solutions for Wetherspoon to take.

1. Differentiation Strategy: Porter (1985) (see Campbell et al 1999, p. 134-140) argued that commercials should position themselves by using string differentiation from rivals through cost leadership or focus. This is true for Wetherspoon and it should focus on low cost and high customer value leadership.
2. Total Quality Management: there are communities in the for-profit fundraising products (food & drink), Wetherspoon must ensure that the reliability, product and service quality, appearance of facilities and personnel performance is at the high level in order to build brand corporate image, differentiate itself from competitors and gain trust from customers (Manning et al 2006, p. 91-104).

The understanding of marketing is important for both organizations and staffs to create and develop their missions successfully. Charity marketing tells companies how to put customers at the core of the organizational activities and can help them to become more effective at identifying the needs of the customers. Wetherspoon pursues a different strategy by offering the most comprehensive range of product and services to customers (McLeish 1995, p. 42). Cheap quality food and drink is pursuing a lowest-cost strategy is pursuing a niche strategy in focusing on customers, who can enjoy daily food and drink promotions in any outlets in the UK. To make it more competitive, Wetherspoon needs to goes in details of each key to make them better, not just lowering the price, but also improve the quality of the service performance and product quality for customers (Brinckerhoff 2003, p. 12-13)