This advertisement cost Pepsi Millions of dollars, according to several industry newsletters.  But it cost Pepsi even more than that when it had to be pulled from the air.  That cost wasn’t just in dollars.  That cost was in image and brand identity.

This was the headline in TVWeek:

How Pepsi’s Kendall Jenner Fiasco Could Impact the TV Networks

This was the headline in People Magazine.

How Many Millions Could Pepsi’s Pulled Kendall Jenner Ad Cost the Company?

And the link to the actual article:

How Many Millions Could Pepsi’s Pulled Kendall Jenner Ad Cost the Company?

 

This was the headline in The Washington Post:

Pepsi shows how America loves to erase black women

The Washington Post article goes on to say — There’s plenty to unpack in Pepsi’s carbonated hot mess of an ad that was released Tuesday, pulled Wednesday and probably will be hated and ridiculed for years to come.

And the link to the actual article:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2017/04/06/pepsi-shows-how-america-loves-to-erase-black-women/?utm_term=.c23f8ebc654d

This was the headline in The New York Times:

A Pepsi Commercial’s Lesson for Advertisers

The point in all this?

This multi-platform world is also a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural world. And what you say (content) is still more important than where you say it (platform).