Are hollow corporate gestures really what the Queen would have wanted?

In the wake of King George VI’s death, all cin­e­mas and the­atres closed, sports fix­tures were can­celled and flags were low­ered to half-mast to reflect the mood of the nation.

Fol­low­ing the death of Queen Eliz­a­beth II, many busi­ness­es have sought to pay their respects to the late British monarch through social media posts or by clos­ing their doors on the date of her funer­al. 

In their eager­ness to share in the nation’s griev­ing, how­ev­er, brands risk send­ing out the wrong mes­sage. Take Ann Sum­mers, whose hur­ried trib­ute to the Queen appeared above links to pur­chase sex toys and lin­gerie on its site. 

Or Cross­Fit UK, which added a “one-minute rest in silence” to the “Queen Eliz­a­beth II” work­out rou­tine it shared on Insta­gram hours after her death was con­firmed.

The psy­chol­o­gy of social media gen­er­ates a need to be seen and, as the num­ber of blacked-out logos on Twit­ter increased, the pres­sure grew for more com­pa­nies to fol­low suit. 

But, no mat­ter how well-inten­tioned the trib­ute, com­pa­nies must walk a fine line between def­er­ence and dis­re­spect. Although toy man­u­fac­tur­er Play­mo­bil may have con­sid­ered its black and white pic­ture of one of its fig­ures dressed as the Queen a fit­ting homage, Twit­ter users labelled it “grotesque”.

If the mes­sage is mis­in­ter­pret­ed, it can eas­i­ly appear as though busi­ness­es are turn­ing the Queen’s death into a mar­ket­ing oppor­tu­ni­ty. Accord­ing to a new YouGov sur­vey, 58% of the British pub­lic say brand mes­sages about the Queen are dri­ven by PR rea­sons rather than a sin­cere desire to pay respects, while only three in 10 say it’s more like­ly that these mes­sages come from the heart.

It rais­es the ques­tion of whether these brands even need­ed to share any­thing in the first place. While the Queen’s health wavered, was any­one left think­ing, “I won­der whether Shrek’s Adven­ture! will pay a mark of respect?”

As one social media user said: “If I was a brand right now I would sim­ply not tweet.”

In tra­di­tion­al media, many brands have tak­en the oppo­site approach, pulling adver­tis­ing from print­ed papers and can­celling events. Papers and broad­cast­ers took the deci­sion to intro­duce an adver­tis­ing black­out, while Burber­ry and Raf Simons have pulled out of their Lon­don Fash­ion Week shows.

The actions of these busi­ness­es and the response of con­sumers show that, in cer­tain cir­cum­stances, step­ping out of the spot­light can gen­er­ate the best PR.

This per­ceived need to be seen to be respect­ful has also jumped from the pages of social media and into the real world. Ear­li­er this week, super­mar­ket chain Mor­risons pledged to turn down its check­out ‘bleeps’ in hon­our of the Queen and Cen­tre Parcs announced it would be shut­ting its UK sites for the day of the state funer­al.

Hol­i­day­mak­ers were quick to share their dis­may at the company’s deci­sion, which would have made it nec­es­sary for many to vacate the park for the night, only to return again the next day. Cen­tre Parcs claims the ges­ture was “a mark of respect” but had to reverse its deci­sion fol­low­ing the back­lash from its cus­tomers. It leaves us ques­tion­ing whether it was worth doing any­thing in the first place?

At this time, all peo­ple real­ly want is for busi­ness­es to reflect the som­bre mood of the nation. This could include can­celling a planned cor­po­rate par­ty, post­pon­ing a new prod­uct launch or shar­ing fond mem­o­ries of vis­its from the Queen. It doesn’t mean that Domino’s has to share its con­do­lences with the Roy­al Fam­i­ly on Twit­ter.