Burger King’s Ad Agency Apologizes For Bizarre ‘Pride Whoppers’
Images via Burger King Austria
Burger King’s Austrian creative agency believes it’s made a whopper of a mistake in its Pride campaign.
Earlier this month, social media ignited as images of ‘Pride Whoppers’ made their rounds. While the sandwiches were intended to denote “equal love and equal rights,” consumers instead fixated on the fact that the inclusive offerings arrived in options of either two top buns or two bottom buns (for equality, Burger King insisted).
The Pride Whoppers are real limited-edition items that will be on offer at Austrian locations through June 20.
It was the unintentional top/bottom metaphor that stuck on the internet, leading the advertising agency behind the idea to apologize.
Burger King Austria made a Pride burger that’s either two tops or two bottoms… what in straight hell? pic.twitter.com/bSl3Cyiq9p
— Jarett Wieselman (@JarettSays) June 3, 2022
As first reported on Ad Age, Austrian agency Jung von Matt Donau took to LinkedIn to post a statement, clarifying that it had good intentions.
“We at JvM Donau are proud of our queer community within our agency. Unfortunately, we still messed up and didn’t check well enough with community members on different interpretations of the Pride Whopper,” it wrote. “That’s on us.”
The agency added that the creation of the Pride Whopper was meant to convey a message of “equal love and equal rights.”
“Our strongest concern is if we offended members of the LGBTQ Community with this campaign. If this is the case, we truly apologize,” Jung von Matt Donau continued.
The advertising agency said it will learn from this incident and will involve more members of the LGBTQ+ community in the decision-making of its future work.
The campaign is still live on Burger King Austria’s social media channels as of the time of writing.
[via Ad Age and Vulture, images via Burger King Austria]
