In a 'doomed if you do, doomed if you don't' type of scenario, Nutella made a splash with its 'Make Me Yours' campaign when it refused a request for a customised jar meant for a five-year old girl named Isis.
The incident started when the little girl's aunt decided to try Ferrero's promo and ordered a few large jars of Nutella and had them personalised for her niece Isis and Isis' brother Odhinn. While the girl's name is taken from Egyptian mythology rather than the terrorist group, Ferrero's software only understood that the letters spelled a blacklisted name and refused to make the personalised print. Odhinn's however was accepted and printed.
Ferrero Australia rang Isis' family to confirm the ban. "Like all campaigns, there needs to be consistency in the way terms and conditions are applied," Ferrero explained. "Unfortunately, this has meant there have been occasions where a label has not been approved on the basis that it could have been misinterpreted by the broader community or viewed as inappropriate."
Mum Heather Taylor was understandably upset and says that Ferrero's decision in a way promotes public negativity against her daughter's name.
Another mum, Sheridan Leskien, who also has a daughter named Isis had to make a public appeal much earlier saying that the media's and general references to ISIS has had a very negative impact on their whole family and worries about her daughter's future. Politicians and national media responded to her appeal and made the conscious effort to refer to the terrorist organisation by its other nominations: Islamic State, IS, ISIL or Daesh.
Nutella, however, is apparently not new to the association as CNN anchor Carol Costello made a statement earlier this year - albeit unconfirmed - that Nutella unwittingly plays a part in ISIS' recruitment method for Western women: "As ISIS continues to gain territory across the Middle East, the recruitment of young women to its ranks is becoming increasingly important to the group."
"How do you relay your message of jihad in a way Westerners understand?...They are turning to the language of social media and that seems to be working just fine for ISIS.
"ISIS is talking online about jars of Nutella, pictures of kittens and emojis," Costello says.
She also says that ISIS does this to infer that life in their camps is not so different from life outside of them, that in fact they enjoy Nutella and likely even have pet kittens.
