Winner — Company Partnership Award: Absa Casual Day
Mihloti Mathye, the general manager of corporate social investment at Absa, says social partnerships are the cornerstones of successful and sustainable programmes. He ascribes the success of the Absa Casual Day campaign to a win-win partnership between the bank, its marketing team and the National Council for Persons with Physical Disabilities in South Africa.
The campaign was singled out by Investing in the Future as a winning example of organisations ‘partnering for the benefit of society. Casual Day has generated enormous awareness and benefits.”
Casual Day is a fundraising project under the aegis of the Council for Persons with Physical Disabilities, with five other national beneficiary organisations: the South African Federation for Mental Health, Disabled People South Africa, Deaf Federation of South Africa, Epilepsy South Africa, and the South African National Council for the Blind.
‘The ultimate winners are the people with disabilities served by the beneficiary organisations. The formula that determines the amount each organisation receives is based on the principle that the more involved an organisation is and the more it puts into the project, the greater the share it will receive,” Mathye says.
Absa is the primary sponsor of the campaign and provides Casual Day with the infrastructure to sell stickers, which are distributed to all Absa branches, participating divisions and units, and sold to the public. The administration of the project is carried out at the marketing team’s office in Pretoria.
Apart from infrastructure, Absa provides volunteers and marketing support. ‘Our partnership is not only between Absa at head-office level and the Casual Day national office, but goes to grassroots level, where Absa branches partner local welfare organisations,” says Mathye.
On Casual Day people are asked to dress up, down, funny or fancy — anything other than usual. ‘Every person who participates must wear the official Casual Day sticker, indicating he or she is dressed for the benefit of people with disabilities. The stickers can be bought from the Casual Day office, any Absa, Dion or Game outlet and participating welfare organisations.”
Between 1995 and 2008 the campaign raised R94.7-million. From relatively small beginnings of R413 000 in 1995, funds raised grew to R15.6-million in 2008.
‘Absa also provides the means to boost awareness through its ATMs, statements, telephone messages, Q-TV screens and in-branch posters and billboards. ‘Substantial effort is put into promoting the campaign internally as well and prizes are offered to encourage employees to put their best effort into the campaign,” says Mathye.
He says the winning recipe is linking fundraising and awareness creating to the fun of dressing differently at work. But the challenge each year is to maintain ongoing public support, which was tough in 2008.
‘The global financial crisis raised the cost of living and the resultant increase in poverty led to a marked rise in the number of fundraising activities and a greater demand on the public for donations.
‘Tough economic conditions have called for corporate social investment practitioners to generate a greater impact with fewer funds — something Absa certainly achieved with Casual Day in 2008.”
The project team needed to find an innovative yet cost-effective way to pique public interest. They came up with a fictitious organisation called People Against Suits and Ties, which launched a national movement in favour of casual clothes and put the fun back into fundraising.
Not only did Absa get free coverage and media exposure, but the campaign also generated new interest in Casual Day. Publicity monitoring showed that the free publicity generated by Casual Day totalled R8.5-million, whereas the marketing investment was only R1.4-million.
Mathye points out this can be compared with previous years when the marketing budget was in excess of R2-million, but generated publicity that was nowhere near as effective or far-reaching as that achieved in 2008.
‘The campaign serves as an important example of how corporate organisations can harness the power of their employees to increase the impact, reach and effectiveness of their corporate social investment initiatives.
‘By focusing on a single fundraising effort, getting all staff involved and injecting a sense of fun into Casual Day, Absa was able to motivate employees to achieve the extraordinary.
‘Being part of such a successful and high-profile campaign also fosters a deep sense of employee pride, which has a far-reaching positive impact on our business.”