Not so Dolce, Gabbana..
By Marit Kootwijk
Friday, October 11, 2019
On the 7th of November 2018 Dolce & Gabbana released a video on Instagram and Weibo, a Chinese social media channel, showing an Asian model trying to eat Italian pizza and spaghetti with chopsticks.
This video was posted as an introduction to their fashion show in Shanghai.
The video was seen as racist and offensive to the Chinese culture and on top of it all, co-founder Stefano Gabbana’s insulting reaction on this video got published what made everything even worse.
The way they handled the crisis was very poor and ever since their reputation in Asia has not gotten better this while China has the biggest market in the world that accounts for more than a third of global spending on luxury products. In an analyses of the situation by co-blogger Smigelschi she cited van der Meer, Verhoeven, Beentjes, and Vliegenthart (2017), and their statement that companies allow the crisis to grow when failing to respond to the power and speed of online news media, which we can see is exactly what happened. They have waited too long with their response but as an addition to what happened after, they also could have taken action before. While Smigelschi analyses the focus and frames, such as the human-interest frame where she adresses the ethical issue and the responsibility frame that were used by the journalists and social media users, there was more to blame then how it was framed in the media..
By Marit Kootwijk
Friday, October 11, 2019
On the 7th of November 2018 Dolce & Gabbana released a video on Instagram and Weibo, a Chinese social media channel, showing an Asian model trying to eat Italian pizza and spaghetti with chopsticks.
This video was posted as an introduction to their fashion show in Shanghai.
The video was seen as racist and offensive to the Chinese culture and on top of it all, co-founder Stefano Gabbana’s insulting reaction on this video got published what made everything even worse.
The way they handled the crisis was very poor and ever since their reputation in Asia has not gotten better this while China has the biggest market in the world that accounts for more than a third of global spending on luxury products. In an analyses of the situation by co-blogger Smigelschi she cited van der Meer, Verhoeven, Beentjes, and Vliegenthart (2017), and their statement that companies allow the crisis to grow when failing to respond to the power and speed of online news media, which we can see is exactly what happened. They have waited too long with their response but as an addition to what happened after, they also could have taken action before. While Smigelschi analyses the focus and frames, such as the human-interest frame where she adresses the ethical issue and the responsibility frame that were used by the journalists and social media users, there was more to blame then how it was framed in the media..
C(hina)risis
If the marketing department from D&G would have done their research properly, they would have known their (Asian) audience and insulting their audience could have been prevented. Although Chinese culture is becoming increasingly modern, the Chinese culture still differs a lot from the western culture with traditions and typical Chinese norms and values. Western cultures are often characterized by an individualistic attitude and relatively loose bonds among individuals whereas asian cultures are characterized as a highly collectivistic society with a high commitment to the members of the group. By communicating their fashion show to the audience by showing a Chinese girl with their traditional chopsticks in a condescending way they offended the group Asian people and this miscommunication between two cultures became a true intercultural crisis.
Even though they have a code of ethics on their website, this was not the first time he have been accused of making politically and ethically insensitive statements. That's why intercultural communication is seen as a vital part of understanding in crisis communication and this case confirms this again. Given the influence of cultural dimensions on people’s perceptions, one specific strategy may not necessarily be effective or appropriate across cultures. For example, people in an individualistic culture might have different evaluations or emotional responses toward the organization then do those in a collectivistic culture in terms of how the organization handles the crisis. In general there are two types of crisis communication strategies namely, the crisis response strategies like denial and apology (what they tried, but failed) but also and crisis timing strategies a.k.a stealing thunder. Stealing the thunder of you own mistake? Oh yes, timing is key in crisis times and can definitely minimize reputational damage if you react to "thunder" in a preventable crisis, it will be received to be more credible if it uses a rebuild crisis response strategy in addition to offering objective information.
If the marketing department from D&G would have done their research properly, they would have known their (Asian) audience and insulting their audience could have been prevented. Although Chinese culture is becoming increasingly modern, the Chinese culture still differs a lot from the western culture with traditions and typical Chinese norms and values. Western cultures are often characterized by an individualistic attitude and relatively loose bonds among individuals whereas asian cultures are characterized as a highly collectivistic society with a high commitment to the members of the group. By communicating their fashion show to the audience by showing a Chinese girl with their traditional chopsticks in a condescending way they offended the group Asian people and this miscommunication between two cultures became a true intercultural crisis.
Even though they have a code of ethics on their website, this was not the first time he have been accused of making politically and ethically insensitive statements. That's why intercultural communication is seen as a vital part of understanding in crisis communication and this case confirms this again. Given the influence of cultural dimensions on people’s perceptions, one specific strategy may not necessarily be effective or appropriate across cultures. For example, people in an individualistic culture might have different evaluations or emotional responses toward the organization then do those in a collectivistic culture in terms of how the organization handles the crisis. In general there are two types of crisis communication strategies namely, the crisis response strategies like denial and apology (what they tried, but failed) but also and crisis timing strategies a.k.a stealing thunder. Stealing the thunder of you own mistake? Oh yes, timing is key in crisis times and can definitely minimize reputational damage if you react to "thunder" in a preventable crisis, it will be received to be more credible if it uses a rebuild crisis response strategy in addition to offering objective information.
Even though they have a code of ethics on their website, this was not the first time he have been accused of making politically and ethically insensitive statements. That's why intercultural communication is seen as a vital part of understanding in crisis communication and this case confirms this again. Given the influence of cultural dimensions on people’s perceptions, one specific strategy may not necessarily be effective or appropriate across cultures. For example, people in an individualistic culture might have different evaluations or emotional responses toward the organization then do those in a collectivistic culture in terms of how the organization handles the crisis. In general there are two types of crisis communication strategies namely, the crisis response strategies like denial and apology (what they tried, but failed) but also and crisis timing strategies a.k.a stealing thunder. Stealing the thunder of you own mistake? Oh yes, timing is key in crisis times and can definitely minimize reputational damage if you react to "thunder" in a preventable crisis, it will be received to be more credible if it uses a rebuild crisis response strategy in addition to offering objective information.
They wanted to use Instagram as marketing tool, but then why didn't they instantly used social media to address the crisis? It is stated that crisis communication via social media has a more positive effect on the reputation than crisis communication via traditional media. The classical crisis communication theories mentioned before don't adopt the role of the medium and focus mainly on the interplay between crisis type and crisis communication strategy. With social media being unmissable these days the role of the medium severely increased in crisis management. An organization that uses social media to inform its stakeholders about an organizational crisis signals that it is eager to inform its stakeholders quickly and directly and that it is willing to engage in a dialog with them. Reputation, which is the interactively and communicatively negotiated evaluation and perception of an organization by its different stakeholders , is recognized as one of the most important assets of an organization and often analyzed in crisis communication research.
So Dolce & Gabbana, while we are waiting for your next insensitive statement, get yourself a proper marketing department that knows how to adopt ethics and use social media.
They wanted to use Instagram as marketing tool, but then why didn't they instantly used social media to address the crisis? It is stated that crisis communication via social media has a more positive effect on the reputation than crisis communication via traditional media. The classical crisis communication theories mentioned before don't adopt the role of the medium and focus mainly on the interplay between crisis type and crisis communication strategy. With social media being unmissable these days the role of the medium severely increased in crisis management. An organization that uses social media to inform its stakeholders about an organizational crisis signals that it is eager to inform its stakeholders quickly and directly and that it is willing to engage in a dialog with them. Reputation, which is the interactively and communicatively negotiated evaluation and perception of an organization by its different stakeholders , is recognized as one of the most important assets of an organization and often analyzed in crisis communication research.
So Dolce & Gabbana, while we are waiting for your next insensitive statement, get yourself a proper marketing department that knows how to adopt ethics and use social media.
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About the author: Marit is a 25 year old student based in Amsterdam. She is combining getting a masters degree with all other aspects that come with being a typical student in Amsterdam. Finding out which aspects of communication she likes most, for now she sticks to the practical aspect.
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