Building our reputation by opening our gates

Working on improving corporate reputation can sometimes feel like an uphill battle. There are additional challenges when you don’t sell products under your corporate brand – how can you have a relationship with someone you may never meet?  This is certainly the case for the corporate brand team here at Fonterra. 

We’re proud of our Co-op, proud of the dairy we make and proud of the prosperity we bring to New Zealand. We want Kiwis to feel that way too.

Last year, research indicated that one of the things stopping people liking us was the perception that dairy farming was harming New Zealand’s waterways.  Whilst farming has no doubt contributed to the problems facing our rivers, dairy farmers have spent over $1 billion of their own money on environmental improvements over the past six years and they’re committed to doing a whole lot more.  We needed to let New Zealand know we weren’t sitting on our hands while our nation’s clean green image floated down river.  But this was easier said than done.  When we did a bit more research we discovered that if we just told people the improvements that Fonterra farmers had made, they wouldn’t believe us. Then we realised there was something in the old adage “seeing is believing”, and Open Gates was born.