How Greenpeace reduced Nestlé’s Kit Kat to virtual crumbs

Over the past few weeks, Greenpeace has been leading a massive online campaign against food giant Nestlé and its use of palm oil to make sweets like the popular Kit Kat chocolate bar. The environmental organisation contends that rainforests are being wiped out and replaced by palm oil plantations to feed Nestlé's insatiable demand for the ingredient. With the help of a video that has gone viral and a clever use of social networking sites, Greenpeace has managed to plunge the Swiss corporation into a virtual nightmare. The initiative is a shining example of cyber-campaigning, and websites specialised in Internet strategy are already treating it as a case study. Daniela Montalto, forest campaign head at Greenpeace, takes France24.com behind the scenes of this cyber-success.

Why did you decide to lead a cyber-campaign against Nestlé, as opposed to the more classic campaign operations Greenpeace usually carries out?

Daniela Montalto: Two years ago, we asked Nestlé to stop buying palm oil from a company that was consciously destroying Indonesian forests. They never answered us. Greenpeace had already put a satirical video online as part of a campaign against another company over a year ago, and we thought that with the evolution of social media we could strike harder and in a more organised fashion this time around.

How did you roll out your Web campaign?

D.M.: The first step was to get the information out there. As soon as the campaign was online, we built websites in several languages in order to provide Internet users with proof of Nestlé’s involvement in the destruction of Indonesian forests. Next, we spread the information around on Twitter and Facebook. Then we adapted our approach as the situation evolved.

And the situation evolved in part because of some communication errors on  Nestlé's part…

D.M.: Nestlé asked YouTube to take down one of the videos. For us, this was a turning point. Internet users took Nestlé’s reaction very badly and started spreading the video via their own networks. For us, it was enough to have the video posted on other video-sharing sites. Right now it’s not on YouTube, but it has still been viewed more than a million times!

At that point, you only had to ride the buzz wave?

D.M.: Yes and no. We directed participation by encouraging Web users to bring their protest to Nestlé’s Facebook account [Editor's Note: Nestlé has since closed its Facebook page]. We then asked users to send emails supporting our cause to Nestlé’s CEO. So far, 120,000 emails have been sent. We also opened a section on our campaign website for visitors to create their own logos and videos.

You clearly taught Nestlé a lesson in Web communication. But did the online campaign concretely achieve its initial goal, which was to get Nestlé to stop using the palm oil?

D.M.: The campaign is still underway, and it’s a bit early to draw conclusions. Nevertheless, Nestlé has already promised that it would end collaboration with its Indonesian subcontractor. But it’s a deceptive move, because they can continue to buy palm oil from the subcontractor by simply using an intermediary.