
Vidya Ranganathan
2.1K posts

Vidya Ranganathan
@vid_ranganathan
Reuters global breaking news editor for financial & markets news. Interested in market intelligence, flows, quirks, deals, charts...



McDonald's India (North and East) dropping tomatoes from its dishes made news around July 7, 2023. Subway dropping tomatoes from its dishes made news around July 22, 2023. Burger King India dropping tomatoes from its dishes made news around August 16, 2023. Observe how the announcement was framed by the respective brands, and how the announcement was reported in the news. McDonald's used a standard print-out that was put inside a plastic cover. The title read, "Temporary unavailability of tomatoes". Subway had a better method - it was a better printed board, but the title still was, "Temporary unavailability of TOMATOES". The only difference was the capital letter. Burger King had a wall poster, properly designed and printed. But observe the title: "Even tomatoes need a vacation"! While McDonald's and Subway were aiming for basic functional communication. It's almost like both these brands were grudgingly making an announcement. For Burger King, it's the same announcement. But the person/team who was thinking of the poster went beyond mere functional (that is, "this is what is happening/happened") communication. Instead, they aimed to give the announcement a personality. This is communications 101 in the world of many-to-many communication. If your communication does not stand out, it will not attract attention. But even in normal corporate communication (one-to-one, one-to-many; press releases, public speeches, PowerPoint presentations, advertising, annual reports, etc.), functional communication should not be the aim. The aim should always start with, 'Why should people really care to listen to/read what I'm going to communicate?', instead of, 'This is what I have. I believe this is important and the way I have framed it is adequate. Those who are interested will read it'. In PR and corporate communications, such distinctions can make a dramatic difference. Just look at the way the news of the 3 fast food chains dropping tomatoes framed it. Most outlets picked up exactly what Burger King wrote, bringing a character to the communication even beyond the brand's own store-level communication! #communication #communications #corporatecommunication #PR #publicrelations #writing

















