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It looks like American Family Association‘s just-ended year-long boycott of PepsiCo was good for PepsiCo’s bottom line. PepsiCo reported $43 million in net revenue and a 16% increase in net income as compared to 2008. Not too shabby, considering the country and world suffered from an unprecedented financial crisis in 2009.
AFA began the boycott in January, 2009 because: PepsiCo Foundation donated $500,000 each to Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays and Human Rights Campaign in 2008; and PepsiCo trains its employees not to discriminate against each other.
AFA president Tim Wildmon explained an a Feb. 12 email why he was lifting the boycott now:
Records from PepsiCo, HRC and PFLAG indicate repeat donations did not occur in 2009.Although a few minor issues remain, AFA will continue to monitor PepsiCo. We feel we have made our point. Boycotts have been a last resort for us at AFA, and the PepsiCo boycott was started to address issues of concern to us – especially the promotion of the homosexual agenda in the culture.
Notice how Wildmon now terms PepsiCo’s anti-discrimination training a “minor issue”, despite it being one of only two reasons he gave for starting the boycott? He hopes you’ve forgotten about that. Clearly he’s embarrassed.
As for PepsiCo not making another unprecedented donation to PFLAG and HRC in 2009, I suspect that those huge donations weren’t intended to recur annually.
Looking at all the evidence, Wildmon’s attempted victory lap looks more and more like a sneaky retreat.
6 Comments
16% raise??OMG
Oh what would I do for a 16% increase in my earnings.
I guess when word gets out businesses will be doing whatever they can to be boycotted by the American Family Association.
In fact I wonder if they would consider boycotting me? Come on, I really need that extra cash!
Fundies really SUCK at Boycotts….poor dahlingsWe progressives (and specificly us queers) are good at Boycotts, I still don’t buy FL orange juice or Coors beer, and I’d eat glass before I was a tourist of CO or UT.
AFA may get a few requests that they boycott their business too…LMQAO!
However, Pepsi DID stop givingNo more donations..I would be careful about our side claiming victory.
What I am claiming is defeat for AFATheir boycott was clearly completely ineffectual. Unless you know that Pepsi had pre-boycott plans to follow-up in 2009 with more $$ for those organizations, it is impossible to conclude that the boycott had any effect on Pepsi’s giving plans. What is more likely is that they, like so many corporations and foundations, gave very little money in 2009 relative to prior years because of the economic disaster.
They did the same thing with FordAFA did their famous boycott of Ford for a couple of years because Ford was donating money to LGBT causes and gives domestic partner benefits. They even had the big counter on their site of how many people were refusing to buy Fords and all that.
I did the math on it, and based on the numbers on their counter, the number of licensed drivers and cars in service in the U.S., the number of new cars sold by Ford and total industry, AT BEST the AFA’s boycott was good for 0.1 percent of Ford sales. AT BEST.
Of course, when Ford started cutting its losses and looked like it was going to turn things around, the AFA canceled the boycott and claimed it had “succeeded”, when in reality Ford had massively cut ALL marketing because of their losses. Of course, Ford still supports LGBT causes and now provides some transgender benefits in addition to domestic partner benefits. In other words, AFA=FAIL!