Yoshida 1
Ren Yoshida
Professor Marcotte
English 101
4 November 2019
Sometimes a Cup of Coffee Is Just a Cup of Coffee
A farmer, her hardworking hands full of coffee beans, reaches
out from an Equal Exchange advertisement (Advertisement). The
hands, in the shape of a heart, offer to consumers the fruit of the
farmer’s labor. The ad’s message is straightforward: in choosing
Equal Exchange, consumers become global citizens, partnering
with farmers to help save the planet. Suddenly, a cup of coffee
is more than just a morning ritual; a cup of coffee is a moral
choice that empowers both consumers and farmers. This simple
exchange appeals to a consumer’s desire to be a good person—
to protect the environment and do the right thing. Yet the ad
is more complicated than it first seems, and its design raises
some logical questions about such an exchange. Although the ad
works successfully on an emotional level, it is less successful on a
logical level because of its promise for an equal exchange between
consumers and farmers.
The focus of the ad is a farmer, Jesus Choqueheranca de
Quevero, and, more specifically, her outstretched, cupped hands.
Her hands are full of red, raw coffee, her life’s work. The ad
successfully appeals to consumers’ emotions, assuming they will
find the farmer’s welcoming face and hands, caked with dirt,
more appealing than startling statistics about the state of the
environment or the number of farmers who lose their land each
year. It seems almost rude not to accept the farmer’s generous
Source: Hacker/Sommers (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2021).
This paper follows the style guidelines in the MLA Handbook, 9th ed. (2021).
Analyzing an Advertisement (Yoshida)
Marginal annotations indicate MLA-style formatting and effective writing.
The source is cited
in the text. No page
number is available
for the online
source.
Thesis expresses
Yoshida’s analysis
of the ad.
Yoshida summarizes
the content of the ad.
Details show how
the ad appeals
to consumers’
emotions.
9/17
Source: Hacker/Sommers (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2021).
Yoshida 2
offering since we know her name and, as the ad implies, have
the choice to “empower” her. In fact, how can a consumer resist
helping the farmer “[c]are for the environment” and “[p]lan for
the future,” when it is a simple matter of choosing the right
coffee? The ad sends the message that our future is a global
future in which producers and consumers are bound together.
First impressions play a major role in the success of an
advertisement. Consumers are pulled toward a product, or pushed
away, by an ad’s initial visual and emotional appeal. Here, the
intended audience is busy people, so the ad tries to catch viewers’
attention and make a strong impression immediately. Yet with a
second or third viewing, consumers might start to ask some logical
questions about Equal Exchange before buying their morning
coffee. Although the farmer extends her heart-shaped hands to
consumers, they are not actually buying a cup of coffee or the
raw coffee directly from her. In reality, consumers are buying
from Equal Exchange, even if the ad substitutes the more positive
word choose for buy. Furthermore, consumers aren’t actually
empowering the farmer; they are joining “a network that empowers
farmers.” The idea of a network makes a simple transaction more
complicated. How do consumers know their money helps farmers
“[s]tay on their land” and “[p]lan for the future” as the ad
promises? They don’t.
The ad’s design elements raise questions about the use of
the key terms equal exchange and empowering farmers. The Equal
Exchange logo suggests symmetry and equality, with two red
arrows facing each other, but the words of the logo appear almost
like an eye exam poster, with each line decreasing in font size
Words from the ad
serve as evidence.
Clear topic sentence
announces a shift.
Yoshida begins to
challenge the logic
of the ad.
Yoshida interprets
details such as the
farmer’s hands.
Source: Hacker/Sommers (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2021).
Yoshida 3
and clarity. The words fairly traded are tiny. Below the logo,
the words empowering farmers are presented in contradictory
fonts. Empowering is written in a flowing, cursive font, almost
the opposite of what might be considered empowering, whereas
farmers is written in a plain, sturdy font. The ad’s varying fonts
communicate differently and make it hard to know exactly what is
being exchanged and who is becoming empowered.
What is being exchanged? The logic of the ad suggests that
consumers will improve the future by choosing Equal Exchange.
The first exchange is economic: consumers give one thing—
dollars—and receive something in return—a cup of coffee—and
the farmer stays on her land. The second exchange is more
complicated because it involves a moral exchange. The ad suggests
that if consumers don’t choose “fairly traded” products, farmers
will be forced off their land and the environment destroyed.
This exchange, when put into motion by consumers choosing to
purchase products not “fairly traded,” has negative consequences
for both consumers and farmers. The message of the ad is that
the actual exchange taking place is not economic but moral;
after all, nothing is being bought, only chosen. Yet the logic of
this exchange quickly falls apart. Consumers aren’t empowered to
become global citizens simply by choosing Equal Exchange, and
farmers aren’t empowered to plan for the future by consumers’
choices. And even if all this empowerment magically happened,
there is nothing equal about such an exchange.
Advertisements are themselves about empowerment—
encouraging viewers to believe they can become someone or do
something by identifying, emotionally or logically, with a product.
Summary of the
ad’s key features
serves Yoshida’s
analysis.
Yoshida shows why
his thesis matters.
Source: Hacker/Sommers (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2021).
Yoshida 4
In the Equal Exchange ad, consumers are emotionally persuaded
to identify with a farmer whose face is not easily forgotten and
whose heart-shaped hands hold a collective future. On a logical
level, though, the ad raises questions because empowerment,
although a good concept to choose, is not easily or equally
exchanged. Sometimes a cup of coffee is just a cup of coffee.
Conclusion returns
to Yoshida’s thesis.
Conclusion includes
a detail from the
introduction.
Source: Hacker/Sommers (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2021).
Yoshida 5
Work Cited
Equal Exchange, equalexchange.coop.
Accessed 14 Oct. 2019.
Advertisement for Equal Exchange.
Work cited page is
formatted in MLA
style: First line of
the entry is at the
left margin; extra
lines are indented
1⁄ 2″.
