phlebotomycourses: British Gas: the brand that tried to buy swimming

Rather than dropping prices, the energy giant uses a partnership with one of our favourite sports to 'transform consumer attitudes' and win over 'detractors'. Excuse me while I projectile vomit

My house is a strict place. I have rules about who is allowed to do an advert and who isn't. According to my rules, if a comedian choses to flog car insurance, for instance, it completely undermines my enjoyment of their satire. "Sellout!" I roar at the TV as I lounge in my unlaced Doc Martens and indoor donkey jacket. (For younger readers: "sellout" is what lefties used to shout in the 80s; you might know it as "shill".) I'm more lenient with actors ? they're not selling their entire souls to the devil. But God help you if you turn up at mine proferring Kit Kats.

I know that no one in the corporate world does something for nothing. I'd always assumed that British Gas sponsor swimming because they want our pools hot and hotter, heated by their good selves. A hot pool means a fantastic energy bill. Great Lengths, a book I highly recommend for anyone interested in our historic indoor pools, details how the first baths were heated to around 20C. In 1962, the government recommended 22-24.5C; now the standard is 26-27C for training pools and up to 30C for teaching pools. No wonder British Gas loves swimming, I'd harrumph bitterly: we pay their flipping bonuses. (Five bosses shared �16.4m in pay and bonuses last year.)

I'm usually right but thought I'd check so I Googled "Why do British Gas sponsor swimming?" and found a different answer in a document supported by a jazzy little film. I'm familiar with the word "greenwash"; this is more bluewash, and I've rarely seen it laid out quite so boldly. This is it, pr�cised:

No one loved British Gas. Can you guess why? "Negative customer experience like high bills and call centres were part of the problem." No shit. I mean NO SHIT. I picked myself up off the floor and read on. Boo hoo, they were languishing in third place in the net promoter score (NPS) charts ? a measure of customers' willingness to recommend a brand. What to do?

In a scheme devised by Carat, "the world's leading independent media planning and buying specialist", they took �15m from their branded ad budget (did I mention that Centrica, which owns BG, made an operating profit of �1.58bn for the six months to June this year?) and invested it in a six-year partnership with swimming. Swimming is good, they thought. Swimming reaches "alpha mums and weekend dads". (I was momentarily bought off. I'm an alpha mum! I must text my kids and tell them.) With that �15m, "Carat ensured British Gas owned the sport from paddling pool to podium". Lovely, isn't it? British Gas "owns" your sport.

And yes, part of it is lovely. With that ad money they gave away 300,000 pool sessions. They taught 10,000 people to swim. They helped community baths cut their energy bills by 10% ? a particularly keen irony. They also "got 10,000 people swimming in open water" through their association with Great Swim, though I'd question whether they actually "got" me or any other open-water swimmer I know. (There are a lot of convenient x10,000s in the figures.) Oh and let's not forget that the Great Swim connection gave them four hours' exposure on Channel 4, which would have cost them millions as a straight "buy".

I know that every person they taught to swim will be grateful for a life-enhancing ability, and that the rest of us are saved from �15m of ads. And for British Gas? Carat report that "the number of detractors shrank from 35% to 28% of all customers. In year one, we have already achieved our long-term goal: British Gas now has the highest NPS of any energy supplier ? Carat has transformed consumer attitudes to British Gas."

I don't know if Carat have read the papers lately. They might want to change the "has" to "had".

I might not like seeing athletes plastered with corporate logos, and sigh every time I see Jessica Ennis-Hill in a Santander tabard, but I know that sponsorship of sport is currently necessary. In that world, the grassroots often gets ignored, playing second baton to the more glamorous top end. That this initiative plays to the gallery and the stalls is a good thing. Until we have proper funding for all, we need these relationships to prosper, and they only will if they are mutually beneficial. As I said, nobody in the corporate world does something for nothing.

Pamela Brown, brand experience manager for British Gas (her job title alone makes me froth) describes the work BG did with Carat as being "grounded in a clear insight about what affected customer perceptions". Because that's the bottom line: customer perception. Not actual customer experience, "like high bills and call centres", but perception. It's not about changing their behaviour: it's about changing how we see that behaviour.

So, for the record, how do I now perceive British Gas? More lightly, with more love in my heart? Absolutely not. Am I one of the 7% who have ceased to be detractors? Am I buggery. They tried to buy me, you and every other swimmer. We were NPS fodder. In my case, they failed. I'm trying not to swear, because that's not the kind of thing alpha mums do. But I can say that this winter I'll be burning my British Gas-emblazoned Great Swim T-shirt to keep warm.

Jenny Landreth