You log on to your computer and discover—splashed across the news section of your homepage—a candid snapshot of your celebrity spokesperson inhaling from an enormous bong. Quick, what do you do? If you're Speedo or Omega, and your spokesperson is Michael Phelps, you do nothing. If you're Kellogg's, however, you announce you won't extend his contract, which expires this month.

Political commentator Cenk Uygur argues that Kellogg's decision would have made sense in 1955, but not in 2009. "You know how many people have smoked marijuana in America?" he says. "A whopping 42%. That is a huge chunk of the country Kellogg's has just personally insulted because they are saying implicitly that their behavior is so wrong that they would fire them over it."

Further, he claims, the vast majority of Americans—even those who have never sampled the illicit drug—see nothing wrong with the occasional use of marijuana; therefore, by catering to an anachronistic minority, Kellogg's runs the risk of alienating those who consider the controversy much ado about nothing.

Your Marketing Inspiration is to determine whether you agree with Uygur's perspective, which he sums up like this: "You are no longer protecting your brand when you are prudish and overly careful," he says. "You just seem out of touch."

More Inspiration:
Ted Mininni: A Hot Market Watered Down?
Allen Weiss: What the Young People Say About Social Media
Valeria Maltoni: A Tale of Two C ... ontents

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