I’m allowed to be cheeky.

Lipton is bringing hot tea to Austria. We’re asked to adapt the German campaign “Lipton welcomes everyone”: a house where everyone is welcome. For me, it becomes the most political campaign of my career.

Susanne is the driving force behind the campaign’s stance. I make absolute freedom in community management a condition. I know we’re in for a right-wing shitstorm. More than that: I want to use the provocation deliberately to boost reach. Susanne knows this and lets me get on with it.

The campaign visual is mine: “Offenheit versetzt Berge. Mehr denn je!” (“Openness moves mountains. Now more than ever!”). I deliberately use “Mehr denn je” as an allusion to Van der Bellen. It’s a presidential election year. The political charge is no accident.

I handle community management myself for the first 24 hours to protect my team. And because I enjoy being allowed to be cheeky. I have their full backing. Cheeky, yes; malicious or aggressive, no.

One comment sticks in my mind in particular: a user writes, more or less, that before drinking our “lefty-leftist swill”, he’d rather drink his own urine. I reply, more or less: Well then, enjoy it.

Less amusing are the calls for violence against me on Twitter, as the agency boss responsible. As I experienced it at the time, some come close to calls for my murder. Susanne stands by me even then. I feel less threatened than vindicated: in the campaign’s stance and in my assessment of the attackers.

DER STANDARD reports on the mobilisation, including from the Identitarian movement, against Lipton’s call for openness and exchange (DER STANDARD).

As I remember it, the article turns things around. The shitstorm is followed by a candystorm. People post photos of whole trolleys full of Lipton tea they’ve bought because they think the campaign is brave.

It worked. Goal achieved.