This week its a round of applause for everyone’s favourite Crayon maker while punk brewers Brewdog suffer a PR disaster.

Heroes: Crayola

Crayola have taken advantage of both National Crayon Day (March 31) and April Fools Day falling next to each other by announcing that they would be permanently ceasing production on one colour of crayon.

This would be the first time that Crayola have dropped a crayon from their iconic 24 colour box, with the public still being kept in the dark as to which colour might potentially be erased.

The public could enjoy a thrilling live stream on National Crayon Day to help celebrate the day, whilst #whosleaving was used to drum up social media interest. There is also currently a countdown on their website for those eagerly awaiting the big announcement.

Not only has this appeared a successful campaign, but releasing it several days before April Fools Day has given them an advantage over the hundreds of other colourful April fools campaigns that we’ll surely see over the coming weekend.

Villains: Brewdog

Today’s PR villain is a sad example of a business becoming the very kind of organisation that it initially set out to defeat.

Brewdog, the popular brewery and chain of pubs, came under fire this week after backing down in a legal argument with a pub that shared the same to one of Brewdog’s drinks.

The pub was initially named The Lone Wolf, but after pressure from lawyers they were forced to drop the ‘lone’ from their name.

The legal dispute caused outrage, as Brewdog, who describe themselves as the ‘punk’ brewery, have long sought to challenge similar tactics that they believe faceless beer companies employ.

Ironically, Brewdog themselves have faced legal action in the last year from lawyers representing Elvis Presley’s’ estate, after Brewdog launched a beer titled ‘Elvis Juice’.

And as if one legal dispute wasn’t bad enough, a landlord in Leeds has claimed this week that Brewdog has threatened him with a lawsuit for attempting to open a pub with ‘punk’ in its name.

Toby Green, who plans on opening the Draft Punk pub in Leeds, pointed out that “They can’t own punk, that’s the whole point… It’s inherited, it’s British culture.”

Well said Toby, well said.

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