New Age marketing in Sweden

Skellefteå Kraft is a municipality-owned power company in Sweden, established in 1908. It operates in Sweden and Finland. The company owns a number of hydroelectric power stations and a stake in the Forsmark Nuclear Power Plant. Their revenue for 2014 was $560 million (USD), making them the fourth largest power company in Sweden.

That's not your average peddler of woo ...

But this is their latest advertising campaign: "Get different energy advice."

Our latest experts know everything about different energies at home. They advice in Feng shui, crystal energy and how you can clean your home from bad energies. All to provide you with better energies in the place where you eat, sleep and socialize. 

Here you can book 30 minutes of advice via online video with one of our experts, or upload a plan design or picture of your home to get help with everything from furnishing to exorcism 

[Chaos magician, Crystal therapeut, Feng shui expert]

- Skellefteå Kraft, October 2015

The three "experts" aren't actors. They are real people with enough faith in their services to provide them at a fee. The Chaos guy gives courses in exorcism, elementar magic and soul trips "through dimensions and other worlds, reality, space" at $700/subject. The Crystal lady offer various healing therapies, shamanic healing and a pyra... an MLM scheme on nutritious junk; a course on eg pendulum healing ("esoteric old knowledge on how to clean, heal and balance energies beyond time and space with a pendulum") is two days for $220. The Feng Shui lady does feng shui analysis and recommendations at $100-150/hour. These people are given first class PR by a major company.

After a day or two of criticism, ridicule and lost customers, the company adjusted the campaign. Chaos and crystals were thrown out, but feng shui remained. "Feng shui is more established," as Christoffer Svanberg, head of marketing, told the news.

Links in Swedish:
Efter kritiken: Kaosmagiker stoppas [After criticism: Chaos magician stopped], Swedish Television News Västerbotten, October 13 2015
Efter kritiken: Skellefteå Kraft backar - avslutar samarbete med kaosmagiker och kristallterapeut [After criticism: Skellefteå Kraft backs down - ends cooperation with chaos magician and crystal therapeut], Norran, October 13, 2015