The Drum Awards for Marketing - Extended Deadline

-d -h -min -sec

Ice Bucket Challenge Macmillan Cancer Support

Macmillan Cancer defends itself after allegations it has attempted to hijack ALS Ice Bucket Challenge

Author

By Stephen Lepitak | -

August 25, 2014 | 5 min read

Charity Macmillan Cancer has been accused of attempting to hijack the Ice Bucket Challenge currently being taken by well-known faces around the world, away from the ALS Association.

The Ice Bucket Challenge, which as of Sunday 24 August had made $70.2m worldwide in donations for the charity that attempts to battle Motor Neurone disease, has been taken by a diverse range of personalities such as Will Smith, Shakira, Bill Gates and Scotland’s First Minister, Alex Salmond.

Each person taking the challenge in the name of Macmillan has been asked to donate £3 to the charity. However, Macmillan Cancer Care came in for criticism for seemingly attempting to divert the challenge and has taken to Twitter in an attempt to defend itself.

Another tweet from the charity claimed that its supporters had begun to fundraise through taking the challenge in early July.

A blog post on the charity’s website by its head of digital, Amanda Neylon, attempted to bring some perspective to the controversy.

“We’ve seen thousands of our supporters braving the challenge for us in the past few weeks. And we think it’s awesome that they’ve chosen to do it for us. But people are also drenching themselves for other charities, and that’s just great too. Whoever people choose to raise money for, we’re just delighted that people are fundraising,” she stated.

The latest names to take the challenge were Alex Salmond his deputy first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, ahead of the second referendum debate on Scottish Independence, where he will once again face rival Alistair Darling (who took the challenge last week.)

Ice Bucket Challenge Macmillan Cancer Support

More from Ice Bucket Challenge

View all

Trending

Industry insights

View all
Add your own content +