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UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH AT UST

YOUNG SCHOLARS GRANT recipient Reggie Aspelund is aware of the negative connotations that can come to mind when people think of marketers. “In some ways, marketers [earned this reputation] by getting people to buy stuff they really don’t need,” Aspelund said. “But I also think that the market has changed now, and people are actually requiring brands to do something with a social component.”

As an example, Aspelund cited a research project he did during one of his classes. “I was talking to some millennials—younger than me, as you can see I’m an older student—and one of the big things

that they say is younger people don’t have brand loyalty,” Aspelund said. “That was definitely true when doing research in jeans, but the minute you start talking about TOMS, they wouldn’t even think about using a replacement or copycat brand. And it’s because of the social mission.”

For his summer 2014 Young Scholars grant project, Aspelund took it a step further in his research, and investigated whether brands that use storytelling to share their social mission are

effective in not just creating loyalty, but also in engaging consumers in the social mission that they support. He looked at Chipotle’s “Cultivate” campaign, and invited people to participate in a survey—

and then at the end, asked if they’d like to donate some of what they received as compensation back toward Chipotle’s efforts.

“In my project, I was hoping people would donate a third of what they received for doing the survey back to the cultivation foundation—but what I’m finding is that it’s all over the board. It takes multiple touchpoints to move people to get more involved,” Aspelund said. “I think that was the biggest takeaway–as much as you think that something can happen really quickly, or you think something based on your intuition or wishful thinking, that’s not the case at all. There are so many other variables.”

Aspelund believes that the type of research he is doing in this project could be helpful to other organizations in the future, especially those who provide products or services with the purpose of advancing a social mission. “There has been a lot of research in the past on why storytelling works—for convincing people to buy something, or maybe even liking the brand because it creates an emotional connection. But there is nothing that really talks about how that can go beyond the purchase,” Aspelund said.

“There are a lot more brands that are doing this now—Finnegans Charitable Beers is a big one—and benefit corporations are legal in Minnesota now,” Aspelund said. “They’re trying to figure out the best way to advance their social mission while at the same time delivering a product or service, so this could be something of value for them as well.”

When brands share their social mission, everyone wins, Aspelund says. “Not only does social entrepreneurship help someone out, but it creates this glue between the brand and the consumer,” Aspelund said. “I think that’s the key part in how this kind of research has helped me see what I want to do next, whether I work with an ad agency or a brand.”