Donating to Children's Hospital... Promoting Products and Taking Bribes
Even Prime Minister Meloni Steps Up to Voice Criticism
Kianna Ferani (36), a world-renowned fashion influencer from Italy, has been embroiled in a fake donation controversy. As a result, advertisements featuring Ferani as a model have been consecutively canceled, causing significant repercussions.
On the 5th (local time), the Italian daily La Repubblica reported, "Coca-Cola has canceled the TV commercial featuring Ferani as a model." This commercial was scheduled to air from the end of this month, just before the opening of Italy's national song festival, the 'Sanremo Music Festival.'
Recently, the Italian eyewear manufacturer Safilo also terminated its licensing contract with Ferani.
Ferani began by running a fashion blog in 2009 and is now a super influencer with over 30 million followers. In 2017, she ranked first in Forbes' global fashion influencer rankings.
The fake donation controversy surrounding Ferani surfaced in November last year. At that time, she collaborated with the confectionery company Balocco to release a Christmas cake, saying, "Let's buy Christmas cakes and also donate to children's hospitals."
Ferani introduced that she personally designed the cake, and the cake bearing her design label was sold at 9 euros (about 13,000 won) each, more than twice the usual price.
However, according to an investigation by the Italian antitrust authority, the proceeds from the Christmas cake sales were not donated to the children's hospital as Ferani claimed. The only donation was 50,000 euros (about 72 million won) that Balocco had donated to the children's hospital several months before the cake's release.
It was revealed that Ferani received more than 1 million euros (about 1.44 billion won) from Balocco as a condition for promoting the Christmas cake.
The antitrust authority judged that Ferani and Balocco colluded to deceive consumers and imposed fines of 1,075,000 euros (about 1.55 billion won) on Ferani and 420,000 euros (about 600 million won) on Balocco, respectively.
However, the controversy showed no signs of cooling down, and even Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni voiced criticism, indicating that Ferani's image as an influencer has taken a considerable hit.
On the 18th of last month, Ferani posted an apology video on her Instagram, stating, "I made a well-intentioned mistake by linking commercial activities with charitable activities," and pledged to donate 1 million euros to the children's hospital.
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