"New Face of Ferrero" competition - only white children should apply?

[RedApple11]

Just bought a pack of Ferrero treats for my DD and was shocked at what looks like a blatantly discriminatory campaign. The new "Faces of Ferrero" (ie, the winning children whose images will be used to promote Ferrero products) are all white and fair featured. Five boys, one girls. Are only fair white children attractive enough to be the Face of Ferrero then?

I contacted Ferrero about this and was told:

"We would like to stress that the competition was judged purely on the basis of the children's responses to the question which was: "what they want to be when they grow up and why?".

So I investigated further and discovered that actually, what a crock that was. In fact, all entrants were required to upload their children's photos in order to have a valid entry and these images were then displayed in a gallery. See www.faceofkinder.com/terms.php and scroll down to section 9.3 which states:

"The photograph must have been taken within the last 6 months before it is sent as an entry in the competition. The child must be fully clothed. Whilst entrants may crop and enlarge photographs, they must not submit a photograph which has been substantially altered. By entering into the competition, the entrant agrees that the promoter can visit the child to check that the photograph is an accurate representation of him or her. No changes will be permitted to photographs accepted into the Gallery after the voting period opens on 30th May."

Anyway, the wonderfully white and photogenic winners can all be found here: www.faceofkinder.com/gallery.php

Don't get me wrong, these kids are all gorgeous and this isn't sour grapes - I had no idea about this competition and wouldn't have entered my DD into it anyway.

That said, I think it's outragous that in this day and age, a company like Ferrero can get away with promoting the idea that only fair white children are attractive enough to be the Face of Ferrero. This seems wrong on so many levels.

Nobody hates racism more than me but OP you are being paranoid imo!

and patronising isnt rude at all is it?

The public are more likely to want to join in and vote if they have a cute pic to look at, not just 5000 captions to pick from. And I still maintain it wont take a lot of admin to look through 5000 pics (knowing a bit about IT myself, and having worked in an industry where I used to bulk upload 1000+ documents that had to be 'uniform' in appearance, I do know there are programs that can automatically crop, resize etc so not ignorant at all, maybe your company should look into them? They are amazing for cutting out all the boring legwork. LOL at the thought of someone actually sitting there doing it all manually)

Did you mean programmes Hairylemon? Evidently, spelling not your strong point either :) And bulk uploading Word docs/PDFs is not the same as photos. A photo becomes distorted if you crop it badly.

Still, at least you've now acknowlegded that a cute pic was part of the competition.

Anyway, bored now. Have a fun weekend.

THEY DID NOT LIE

THE PUBLIC VOTED FOR THEIR FAVE 50 WHICH IS WHERE THE PHOTO ELEMENT CAME IN

THE COMPANY THEN PICKED THE WINNERS BY THE BEST CAPTION

Do you think the company in question deleted all the "ethnic minority" children's pics from their website so no one could vote for them!?

Why are you branding this comp as racist?
THE PUBLIC voted for their top 50, is it their fault THE PUBLIC put through more white children??

Or could it be possible that more white children entered this stupid fucking competition which is clearly offending everyone?

My 13 yo ds1 was asked at a football tournament "are you in a gang, how many people have you mugged today" and "I had better hide my phone"
My ds1 asked why he was asking him these questions, the boy replied " black boys are always in gangs, mugging and stabbing people"

That's racist.

A competition won by 6 white children, after a public vote, when we live in England, a majority white country is not racist.

FFS

No no , I meant program, as in a computer program, rather than a TV programme.

HTH

:) at trying to tell hairylemon how to spell and bring corrected herself :)

Nothing worse than trying to show off and really being shown up

I know Tantrums, oh how I sniggered.

And she works in marketing aswell, lets hope its not in the proof reading department

They have not lied about anything. The full terms can be read on their own webpage:

www.faceofkinder.com/terms.php

*"5. VOTING

Public voting via the website will determine the top 50 finalists based on the children with the highest number of votes. "*

and

"The gallery page showing the children is in alphabetical order and bears no resemblance to each child's relative position with regard to the number of votes."

making it clear that the PUBLIC element of voting includes a gallery.

And then:

*6. JUDGING

The top 50 finalists as voted for via the website will be judged by a panel of judges who will decide the 6 winners. At least one of the judges will be independent of the promoter.

The judging criteria will be based on the child's response to 'What do you want to be when you grow up?' and their reason. The creativity and uniqueness of response will form the basis of the judging criteria. For the avoidance of doubt, it is the creativity of the reason that will be the judged element.*

The 'Ferrero staff' element of choosing is based solely on writing criteria.

Hmm, don't know why it bolded only one sentence (meant to bold all the website quotations).

In the email to the OP, Ferrero is defending their own position (not the public's), and says clearly that the judging element of the competition was based solely on writing, which it was according to their terms.

Is this actually still being discussed?

Oh yes, this one refuses to die

i am with you op all advertising should represent our society what message does it give out, some it may not bother but what about for the children it does

my mum entered me for to be the face of pears, i didn't win (though they were interested and wanted more photos) as i was not the traditonal pears look she has never got over her beautiful daughter not winning :o

Um, 6 out of 6 children being white does represent our society. Approximately 9 out of 10 children in this country (according to last census) are white.

Freud this was a competition...yes it would be used for advertising but it was a competition. Of the winners not one of them had brown skin.

Honestly I wouldn't have noticed...because I don't instantly assess the ratio of skin colours in a group or check that there is no chance of racism.

If they only EVER had white children in their advertising I would be joining the OP with torches and pitchforks, but they clearly DO NOT.

well maybe a company should take more responsibility of their advertising are you saying that companies never tweak or manipulate competitions. again this may not have gone on here but i would hate for one child or adult to feel they are the wrong colour to advertise a product that they may use/eat/wear because of the colour of their skin

i am not saying it is racist i am saying that companies should within their advertising reflect the society they are marketing to

There have been a great many posters on this thread with black or mixed race children who have made it very clear that this competition caused them no offence

Agreed thatisall, especially as the advertising does reflect our society.

sniggering heartily @ twotoes' epic fail

This is getting a bit old...I'd much rather argue with a racist person...they really get my back up. Any racist folk out there??? Ambassador? no?

and they talk for every black/mixed race child

i still do think companies should be more representative of everyone if there was a black or asian child within the six we would not even be having this conversation, how often do we see children with disabilities in adverts sadly not often why do they not use products/wear clothes/eat food too

It is a bit old, but it's just the thread that keeps on giving! Every time you think it's going to die here comes another half head with a poorly thought out excuse of an opinion and up it flares again!

Freud
They do not, but you seem to think you do.

So ought they to have removed one of the winning children and replaced them with a (and I hate this phrase) 'token' black child. How offensive, to the black and the white child.

how about the marketing team just pick the children themselves you know to market to all their customers

one picture is so blurry why is it even included (did they get so few to choose from), how many would have badgered their friends to vote for their child or voted again and again. it will probably be won by the child with the most persistent parents. not one of them stands out they are all cute

FreudianSlipper Its all about ratios and percentages.

6 out of 6 all being white is perfectly representative.

9 out of 10 children in this country are white.