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June is Pride month, but for brands it’s “put up or shut up” time

In the face of rising attacks against the LGBTQ+ community, how companies can be allies and deal with the anti-woke movement directly.

June is Pride month, but for brands it’s “put up or shut up” time

[Photos: Israel Albornoz/Unsplash, Cecilie Johnsen/Unsplash]

BY Jeff Beer9 minute read

When Target partnered with the popular artist and LGBTQIA+ activist Chella Man in October 2021, there was no public outcry or protest. The retailer released a short video focused on his book Continuum, and his experience as a deaf, transgender, genderqueer, Jewish person of color. It has more than 2.8 million views. 

Earlier that year, for Pride, Target donated $100,000 to LGBTQ youth organization GLSEN, marking roughly $2 million in contributions over a decade-long partnership. It also released what was then its most expansive Pride collection to date, with offerings across apparel, accessories, footwear, and home decor.  

Fast-forward to the past couple of weeks, and Target finds itself with a bullseye on its back. The retailer has been the subject of a sustained social media campaign demonizing the release of this year’s 2,000-piece Pride products collection. In the wake of the ongoing Bud Light “controversy” for its promotion with a transgender influencer that I cannot believe is still going and is about to enter its third month, Target has also been the subject of a lot of news coverage that has only further fueled the outrage cycle.  

If we step back for a moment then, one can start to draw an angry red line from Disney saying in March 2022 that it opposed Florida’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay” law to Bud Light and Dylan Mulvaney this spring to the backlashes connected to Pride month: Target, The North Face, and Kohl’s, with almost certainly more coming. What connects these moments in time are two things: One, the wave of proposed and often enacted state legislation particularly targeting the rights of transgender individuals—to get gender-affirming care or participate in sports. Two, the conservative belief that it has “lost” corporate America to the “woke mind virus,” as my colleague Clint Rainey wrote in May, and this somehow is part of the fight to win it back.

The anti-LGBTQ backlash against brands is hitting its stride just as Pride Month begins, and there seems to be no end in sight. GLAAD president and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis says there has been a shift in culture. “More than 500 anti-LGBTQ bills have been introduced in American legislatures this year alone,” she notes, “and that’s going to have an effect on the culture we live in.”

The culture may be becoming more polarized, but the rules of powerful branding don’t change. Steve Jobs famously said that Apple’s brand wasn’t about why it was better than Windows but, “Our customers want to know who is Apple and what is it that we stand for? Where do we fit in this world?” Or as Wieden+Kennedy’s head of strategy and University of Michigan prof Marcus Collins told me a few weeks ago, in today’s divided culture, “Take a stand on the things you stand for, and ignore the rest of the noise. This idea of playing to the middle or playing it safe is a myth. You talk to the middle, and you’re talking to no one.”

Pride has been a staple on brand marketers’ calendar for more than a decade, and there’s no reason that shouldn’t continue. In fact, it’s never been more crucial that it does. 

One major reason these brand backlashes have been able to maintain momentum for so long has been the lack of strong-willed response by both Bud Light parent company Anheuser-Busch and Target. It took two weeks after the initial Mulvaney video for Anheuser-Busch CEO Brendan Whitworth to say in a weak statement,, “We never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people. We are in the business of bringing people together over a beer. . . . Moving forward, I will continue to work tirelessly to bring great beers to consumers across our nation.”

Target, meanwhile, issued a statement saying, “Since introducing this year’s collection, we’ve experienced threats impacting our team members’ sense of safety and wellbeing while at work. Given these volatile circumstances, we are making adjustments to our plans.”

These limp responses have surprised LGBTQ advocates. Dr. David J. Johns, executive director of Black LGBTQ+ civil rights group National Black Justice Coalition, says that if he had to grade Target’s response, it’d probably be a D-minus. “In part because what Target did this year for Pride is not new,” says Johns. “They’ve invested in LGBTQ-led and focused organizations all before this year, they knew this June was coming, and they planned to proceed with their commitments, so it’s shocking that their leadership failed to plan for the kind of crisis that ensued. There’s no excuse for them not to be better prepared.”

Imara Jones, Emmy and Peabody Award-winning journalist, podcaster, and creator of TransLash Media, says the backlash isn’t about any genuine consumer outrage, but a coordinated effort to silence companies speaking out on human rights and LGBTQ equality. “It’s really dependent on the idea that companies are cowards that scare pretty easily, and if you make an example of one, the rest will cower in fear,” says Jones. “The other thing is, I don’t think they realized how successful they’d be in targeting the stock price.” Target’s stock is being attacked by conservative activists and it is down almost 20% since May 17, but that is the day that the company announced disappointing earnings and forecast what Reuters called a “grim second quarter.”

For the past decade-plus, brands have been increasingly engaging with and creating content and products aimed at the LGBTQ community and its allies. Those efforts have sat somewhere on the spectrum between sustained, thoughtful investment and support to slapping a rainbow on company social feeds. For many, the biggest controversy has been that level of commitment, with consumers increasingly on the lookout for rainbow-washing—performative support with nothing to really back it up. 

The good news is, brands that engage in year-round support for the LGBTQ community will also build up the confidence and resources to combat any backlash. Steve Gorski, Forsman & Bodenfors head of strategy in New York, says that the first thing any brand should do when starting to think about Pride is to know where it stands on the issue and be prepared to back it up. “Gather your receipts,” says Gorski. “You need to know your brand’s history, and have those receipts. Because the public will have them. You need to truly understand where your brand has been on Pride, historically.”

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Once you’re there, think about who your message is actually for. “As a queer person myself, sometimes I wonder who the audience is for all the ‘Love is love’ products actually is,” says Gorski. “If you really want to support us, look at all the anti-LGBTQ legislation right now, so maybe you need to speak to those people. I’d implore brands to critically think about who the message is for.”

Last year, Popular Information found that 25 corporations that regularly wave the rainbow flag every June had contributed more than $10 million to anti-LGBTQ politicians.

Amid the right-wing fury and the corporate fumbling, there are brands setting an example of how to face down a backlash over Pride. The North Face launched its latest Pride collection, for the second year in a row, with drag artist Pattie Gonia, and was immediately hit with calls for a boycott. 

Yet The North Face responded with what translates as a polite middle-finger to any rage fetishists. In a statement, the brand said, “The North Face has always believed the outdoors should be a welcoming, equitable, and safe place for all. We are honored and grateful to support partners like Pattie Gonia who help make this vision a reality. The Summer of Pride series, now in its second year, has helped foster a more accessible and welcoming environment for individuals from all backgrounds to gather and experience the joy of the outdoors.

“Creating community and belonging in the outdoors is a core part of our values and is needed now more than ever. We stand with those who support our vision for a more inclusive outdoor industry.”

The end. No retreat, just a measured, serious and—this is important-—quick response reiterating its previously held and unwavering values and goals. 

https://youtu.be/EpfLklSG2dQ

Oreo has historically led the pack in how brands approach Pride. Senior brand manager Vishnu Nair tells me that the current backlash against brands hasn’t impacted how Oreo thinks about its approach to Pride. “Oreo will continue to identify ways to serve as an ally to the LGBTQ+ community, creating an open and inclusive environment that brings people together,” says Nair. 

Another way brands can help is to use their scale and creativity to tell stories that show the LGBTQ community as the human beings they are, not some societal threat. Oreo’s films The Note (2022) and Proud Parent (2021) are prime examples. In 2018, P&G created a short film called The Words Matter, to mark the 25th anniversary of the company including sexual orientation into its diversity policy, which also happened to effectively outline the business case for inclusivity.

Perhaps that’s really the place to focus: the bottom line. Bud Light’s sales may be down, but this is the exception, not the rule of the “Get Woke, Go Broke” era. In fact, most companies that have faced a right-wing backlash over a culture issue are doing better than ever

What anti-LGBTQ pearl-clutchers don’t recognize, but every brand on earth should know, is that the future consumer and employee are more accepting and supportive of LGBTQ rights. More than half of all adults who identify as LGBTQ are under 35. A new GLAAD report released this week shows that a record number of non-LGBTQ Americans support equal rights for the LGBTQ community. 

“Companies have to keep their brands relevant,” says Jones. “Gen Z has all grown up with friends and family in the LGBTQ community, and they expect these companies to reflect their lives. And if they don’t they’re not relevant. We’re not talking about a long time from now. This is the next five years. Which is why you have Bud Light reaching out to Dylan Mulvaney in the first place. Their own market research tells them this type of outreach is vital to their brand in order to remain relevant in the next five years.”

GLAAD’s Ellis says the companies and brands it works with have different ways of supporting and helping the movement for equality. “I think our corporate partners are looking more at quiet diplomacy these days than being out in public, because some of these politicians have politicized our community, and CEOs don’t want to get caught up in that,” says Ellis. “This isn’t actually that complicated at all. It’s when companies flounder, that’s when it becomes a mess. If they stick by who they say they are when the spotlight is on them, they do just fine or better.” 

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