Ben & Jerry's Tours with the Dave Matthews Band
May 17th, 2005
Ben & Jerry's Homemade will bring at least one environmental activist along when it goes on the road with the Dave Matthews Band this summer.
Ben & Jerry's piggybacks the band's July-September tour to publicize the issue of global warming. A special flavor, Dave Matthews Band Magic Brownies, rolls out nationally next month, triggering donations to reduce global warming.
Unilever-owned Ben & Jerry's this week launches a Take a Stand with the Band contest to choose an "Enviro-Roadie" to travel with the band for 23 concert dates and host an interactive exhibit with info and action steps to reduce global warming.
The Enviro-Roadie also will distribute samples of Magic Brownies (vanilla ice cream with fudge brownies and raspberry swirls) and keep a blog at the campaign's dedicated site, www.lickglobalwarming.org. A percentage of Magic Brownies sales goes to Dave Matthews Band's BamaWorks Foundation to fund global-warming initiatives.
"Ben and I built Ben & Jerry's on the idea that business has a responsibility to the community and environment," said co-founder Jerry Greenfield in a statement. "Going on tour with [the] Dave Matthews Band is one way that Ben & Jerry's can draw the attention of a broad audience to inspire greater commitment to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. We feel that sharing this information will help to ensure future generations are empowered with the skills and knowledge to protect the world we live in."
Fans 18 to 25 enter Take a Stand with the Band online at www.lickglobalwarming.org (through May 31) with a 250-word essay on what they've done for the environment and why they'd make the best Enviro-Roadie. Candidates are judged on their knowledge of the environment, communication skills, dedication, resourcefulness and willingness to learn; 10 finalists get phone interviews, then three get video-conference interviews.
The winner gets four days of training (on global warming, media relations and Ben & Jerry's Scoop U), then tours with the band from July 16 to Sept. 7. Marketing agency Music Matters, Minneapolis, coordinates efforts between the three partners; Burlington, VT-based Ben & Jerry's handles the contest in-house.
The Lick Global Warming campaign is a collaboration between the band, Ben & Jerry's and SaveOurEnvironment.org, a coalition of 19 top environmental advocacy groups. The three first partnered in 2002 for a concert tour and special flavor (One Sweet Whirled) and Web site to urge consumers to cut their own carbon dioxide emissions by 5% (about 2,000 pounds a year) and write to Congress. Consumers pledged to reduce 200 million-plus pounds of CO2 emissions and wrote 70,000 letters to Congress to cut global warming.