Let’s be clear: creatives deserve to be paid adequately for their work. However, a lot of people don’t seem to know this, like this cafe that’s offering gift vouchers for original designs.
The erring company is The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf Philippines (CBTL) and the hullabaloo started when the cafe announced a contest on Thursday where artists can send in their original designs. The winners’ artworks will be used for CBTL’s upcoming tumbler.
Today, however, the company announced that they will postpone the contest.
In their caption for the first announcement of the contest, they wrote: “Calling all artists! Create an artwork showing off the wonders of the Philippines and get a chance to see it on our next Klean Kanteen merchandise!”
The announcement has since been taken down but below is a screenshot of the post.
Instead of getting people mighty excited, their announcement drew outrage from netizens because they offered only gift certificates to the winners. And they would not be given even a lot — just a measly PHP5,000 (US$95.68)! To make it even worse, the winning artworks would have become CBTL’s property (the post has also been taken down).
Their first announcement drew almost 650 angry reactions, while their post explaining the mechanics of the contest received more than 1,000 angry reactions. Majority of the comments were critical of the company, such as Anna Raneses who told CBTL that they should respect artists.
She also added that the prize money is an insult to artists who would rather have their “pride and dignity intact” than work with them.
Arra Jorge explained to those who couldn’t understand why there was so much outrage over CBTL’s contest.
“The last number [of the mechanics which said], ‘Winning designs will be the property of CBTL.’ That’s a serious issue because they will make money out of the design which you should be earning from. Legally, you’re giving them the copyright of a legitimate asset. If you had copyright, they should pay you for it, in this case, every time they sell the merchandise,” she said.
She added: “There’s value in working in graphic design. This contest perpetuates taking advantage of and degrading the value of such work (graphic design).”
Cynthia Arre was equally outraged and wrote that a PHP5,000 payment for illustration work was “exploitably low.” She added that giving them in the form of gift certificates was “just rubbing salt to the wound.”
Kristine Padagdag said that an artist’s copyrighted work is worth more than PHP5,000 and that since CBTL doesn’t plan on giving the winners royalties, they should at least give a substantial cash prize instead.
To their credit, CBTL said today that netizens’ comments encouraged them to rethink the contest. They wrote: “Your comments and suggestions on our latest contest have been heard. We created this initiative, like the many we have done in the past, to involve our community members in programs where their various talents are discovered and celebrated.”
This is not the first time that someone tried to get design work for cheap. In July last year, actor Jameson Blake asked netizens for a banner design in exchange for a shout out, an act which Blake was overwhelmingly criticized for.
Coconuts Manila called CBTL several times for comment but have not heard back.
