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The well known communication campaign “Pills against the Pain of Others” launched three years ago by the NGO, Doctors without Borders (MSF) to make people aware of neglected diseases in the Third World, such as malaria, AIDS in infants and tuberculosis, is going to be among the business cases that will be studied in universities around the world. This was made possible thanks to the academic research tutored in 2012 by the EADA Marketing professor David Roman along with thirty or so participants on the International MBA, which has just received international recognition with the Curtis E. Tate prize, awarded on October 25th by Nacra – the North American Case Research Association– which distinguished Roman’s work as the best research case published in 2013 in its Case Research Journal.

What’s more, this EADA professor is the first European to earn this distinction which in his opinion “acknowledges good research work that is undertaken outside the United States, where this prestigious prize has most often been awarded up to now”.

EADA professor David Roman alongside one of the images of the “Pills against the Pain of Others” campaign launched by MSF towards the end of 2011.

The case’s discussion topics

The peculiarity of the project, which can be used as a practical case study on MBA, Executive Masters and postgraduate Marketing programmes, is due to the convergence of various factors which make the MSF initiative unique and innovative. The first is the fact that the campaign was a great success to start with -1.5 million packs were sold in just 20 days- yet experienced a spectacular drop in sales over the following three months –falling to 400,000 packs-, which led to a great deal of uncertainty around whether to continue with the campaign or not. According to Roman, this point enables you “to consider how successful the product launch really was and to look into the causes that bring about changes in consumer behaviour”.

Another unique aspect is “the chance to analyse the degree of innovation of the product inside an organisation with a social mission such as MSF that is not at all oriented to marketing and consumer processes”. Among the issues that need to be addressed in this section are the format of the product –simulating a conventional medicine, in a blister with six mint sweets, representing six neglected diseases- and the cooperation between the different stakeholders – official pharmacist colleges, distributors, collaborating companies, etc.”. As the EADA professor points out, “The campaign had such an impact that pharmacies felt obliged to stock the product because otherwise they could be regarded as unsupportive”.

Yet another significant factor is the social environment that the campaign was launched in. According to Roman “we researched the product’s complexity in an environment where there are conflicts between the desire to help others and the purchasing action”.

In the photo, David Roman in EADA, with the Nacra plaque that accredits him as the best academic researcher for 2013.  

Commitment to innovation

David Roman, recently back from Austin (Texas), where the prize giving ceremony took place and where he took part in various workshops which analysed other business cases, explained that “the distinction is in recognition of many hours of work, 2,000 approximately, including the five revisions of the project demanded by the Nacra review panel”. But, he went on to add, “it is also in recognition of the great work and the commitment with innovation imbued in me by Martin Rahe, Economics professor and director of the R+D+i department, and Xavier Bordanova, professor and director of the EADA Retail Management Center both of whom have passed away but remain in our memories”.

In addition to the Nacra commemorative plaque, Roman received a cheque for 2,000 dollars which he will donate entirely to MSF “for them to continue with their humanitarian work all around the world, which is needed more than ever today, for example, the aid they currently need for people suffering from Ebola”.