Latest news with #CorporatePride
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Companies are dialing back their Pride Month celebrations — and angering both the left and the right
Pride Month seems a lot quieter this year in the face of cultural and political pressure. Companies that show half-hearted LGBTQ+ support risk backlash from all sides. Advertising pros tell BI there aren't a lot of great options, but the worst move is to flip-flop. Corporate Pride is looking a little less proud this year. Companies seem to have followed a common Pride Month playbook for the past several years. The checklist included changing social media avatars to rainbow logos, sponsoring parade floats, making donations, or casting ads a little differently from the rest of the year. This June, corporate Pride seems quieter amid a combination of cultural and political pressure against DEI in general, and the LGBTQ+ community in particular. Brands have been dropping out of sponsoring Pride parades across the country, Pride merchandise collections are getting smaller, and Fortune 500 social-media avatars appear largely unchanged. More broadly, companies have pulled back on diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, or at least calling them DEI. The shift has stirred up criticism from both liberals and conservatives. "We're sort of facing a tidal wave of backlash against something that many companies have said they support," Ike Silver, a marketing professor at the University of Southern California's Marshall School of Business, told Business Insider. This has made Pride Month a bigger balancing act for companies this year, particularly those that have openly embraced it in the past. "There's a little bit of a damned if you do, damned if you don't sort of element to this," said Graham Nolan, a PR professional who cofounded Do the Werq, a platform for queer representation in the marketing industry. Pride Month had evolved over the past decade into something that companies perhaps felt obligated to participate in at the risk of appearing out of step with societal norms, Silver said. "It's really more about jumping on the bandwagon," he said, "if you're not getting a boost from it, you might as well not court the backlash." But as reactions to Target — and more recently BarkBox — have shown, brands that have openly embraced Pride Month in prior years face considerable risk stepping back (or even appearing to pull back) from it. Target was one of the most prominent major consumer brands supporting LGBTQ+ Pride. Two years ago, it included Pride merchandise across its stores, but this year and last, it offered a smaller, gentler selection in about half of its locations. A company spokesperson said Target also sponsors local events. "We are absolutely dedicated to fostering inclusivity for everyone," the spokesperson said in a statement to BI. BarkBox found itself in hot water this month when an employee's internal communication suggested the company pull promotions for its Pride merch, comparing them to MAGA products. The leaked message sparked outrage and an apology from founder and CEO Matt Meeker, who said the company stands by its Pride products. Pride Month, Nolan said, became "more a checklist of corporate fears than it was a checklist of consumer desires." People never asked for brands to add rainbows to their logos, for example, Nolan said. Some companies have faced pressure from more left-wing groups that accused them of "rainbow washing," or capitalizing on LGBTQ+ people without providing a tangible benefit to the community. Pride Month became more of a minefield in the last two years as conservatives took aim at Bud Light's partnership with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney, and followed quickly by Target facing blowback for its 2023 Pride merchandise collection. While Bud Light and Target walked back their LGBTQ+ campaigns, the retreats didn't exactly earn them goodwill from either side of the political spectrum. The division between the sides has only grown more pitched under Donald Trump's second presidency. For brands, it can feel like consumers "who oppose the stance see any whiff of support as negative, and those that support the stance will only give you credit if they think that you're really in it," Silver said. "They won't sort of reward these soft steps." Nolan said crafting the right message is increasingly difficult, especially since the very act of speaking to one group can de-emphasize another. "When it's not perfect, what you get is conservatives who are angry about the fact that the work exists, and then you've got liberals who go, 'Yeah, this is a nice ad, but I know this about your hiring practices,'" he said. Beyond the growing political polarization, the issue is further complicated for companies by the threat of government pressure. Trump has shown a willingness to go after companies because of their diversity policies. While taking a stand in the face of real risk can make a company's motives seem more sincere (think Costco or Ben & Jerry's founders, which have defended their stances on diversity), Silver said consumers don't typically punish companies that remain truly neutral. Whether they choose to publicly embrace Pride Month or not, Nolan hopes companies will strategize behind the scenes about strengthening their relationships with the LGBTQ+ community year-round. With shoppers weighing in on social media and scrutinizing companies' moves over the past months, it's clear that shifting positions in either direction can be risky. "When you flip-flop, you lose the people who supported you when you are taking a position," Silver said. "And you don't necessarily regain the people who are against your position." Read the original article on Business Insider
Business Journals
5 days ago
- Business
- Business Journals
Business of Pride 2025
I remember a time, late in the last decade, when tech companies saw the San Francisco Pride march as one more field of competition. Who could field the largest contingent? The loudest T-shirts? The biggest and most outrageous floats? And, crucially, the most eye-roll-inducing queer-dad-joke names for their employee resource groups? Those seem like such innocent times in retrospect. Companies haven't just pulled their floats and their funding for Pride, they've retreated on decades of progress in policies that recognize hateful speech for what it is. If we were to award a prize for Corporate Shame, it might go to Meta, which shamelessly included the anti-LGBTQ dog-whistle term "transgenderism" in its revised, anything-goes policy that allows users of its social-media apps to claim — falsely and against medical science — that homosexuality is a mental illness. For me, this change is a reminder that Pride is not only a celebration, it is also a protest. There is more to protest against now, as revisionist policies sweep away hard-won recognition and protections for some of the most vulnerable parts of the LGBTQ community. As a member of that community but also a journalist, I have to look at the world as it is, not as I might wish it to be. Our 11th annual Business of Pride issue reflects some of those hard realities: the heart of gay San Francisco wrestling with its identity as a neighborhood and the nonprofit behind the Pride march and celebration hustling to make the numbers work. But we also found much to celebrate. Lyft, our Corporate Pride winner, stands out for standing fast to its principles. Niko Storment has built a career as an event producer by embracing queer joy. Thomas Forbes bought a candy shop in North Beach and plans to, in his words, "gay it up." And the life story of Andy Cramer, our Legacy Leader honoree, highlights how so many LGBTQ people have found the freedom to be themselves, to make a living and to find a calling in the Bay Area. I'd like to thank Simon Campbell, special projects editor; photographer Adam Pardee; Ari Mahrer, data reporter; and staff reporter Alex Barreira for their hard work on this special issue. Their effort fills me with even more pride. It is my honor as a gay man to bring you our annual Business of Pride issue. Whatever Pride means to you, I hope you find it in this season. And I hope you find reasons to celebrate, even in the midst of struggle. It's how our community has always gotten through tough times. — Owen Thomas, Managing Editor
Business Journals
5 days ago
- Business
- Business Journals
Corporate Pride: Why Lyft hasn't backed down from its belief in inclusion
For its unflinching embrace of inclusion as a sound business practice, the Business Times recognizes Lyft as its 2025 Corporate Pride award winner.
