As the thread title states. Do you boycott certain manufacturers’ products, not because you don’t like the product quality or the ingredients or how the product is made, but because you don’t like the company or the owners of a particular company for whatever reason?
If you do, do you believe that such boycotts are effective?
And who are the primary companies that you have chosen to boycott and why?
I don’t, for the same reason I don’t boycott music, art or films because of the particular artist.
I don’t eat at Chik-Fil_A because they’re run by bigoted pieces of shit, and I don’t shop at WalMart because they treat their employees like garbage.
I stopped ordering Papa John’s after the whole Romney/Health Care thing. Maybe other companies are the same, blah blah blah but I pick what fights I can and since John Schnatter wanted in the spotlight with his statements & support, that’s who got noticed.
I try to boycott Monsanto as I’m not happy with the effect their GMO soybeans & other products seem to be having on the environment. Also, because boycotting their products mean I buy very little processed food or junk food, which is in and of itself a good idea for my own general health. Kind of a two-birds-one-stone deal.
I’m also trying to lessen my corn footprint for the same reasons, but that’s not Monsanto-specific.
Yep. I don’t expect that they do much if any good except to my ego, but that’s the way I roll.
I do this as well. I know it doesn’t really make a difference in the grand scheme, but it makes a difference to me.
I stopped buying gas at Exxon after the Valdez. I stopped eating at Cracker Barrel because of the way they treated gays. This was mostly because I didn’t want my money go these companies than to put the smack down on them. I knew one customer more or less wouldn’t make a difference to them.
I will usually turn down “pink ribbon” products because of the tactics of SGK. However, if it’s something I need, I won’t go elsewhere looking until I find a non-pink ribbon version. So that’s a semi-boycott.
StG
No, I don’t. Partly because I don’t think it will work. Partly because if it does work, the person who is going to get hurt by it is a) me, for not having the low prices or deals or whatnot, and b) the employees. If a company is hurting they invariably will take it out on the low man on the totem pole.
If I don’t shop at a place it’s because the shopping experience there is generally unpleasant (Walmart) or I can’t afford them anyway.
I would like to claim the same thing, but the reality is that I don’t patronize those places because there are none near me.
I boycotted Hood for a while.
Yes, various companies, and how else could I express my opinion in any fashion that a company would give a shit about? The usual capitalist/libertarian viewpoint on it is that the consumer decides what company will succeed. If I throw my money at a company, they will assume I’m just overjoyed with them.
People technically accidentally “boycott” other companies all the time due to simply not liking their products or not living close enough to a place where they can get them or by not having enough money to buy that brand, so I don’t see what the big moral deal is about boycotting a company because you don’t like their human rights record/animal testing policy/CEO’s toupee/whatever.
For example, is it worse if I don’t give my money to Abercrombie and Fitch if I hate their ephebophile marketing style, or if I hate the douchey ‘yes we exclude fat body types intentionally from our brand’ comments from the CEO, or if I don’t buy because I’m smart enough to know I’m about 25+ years too old to be shopping there? Either way I’m depriving them of my money and potentially putting “little guy” employees out of work.
Is it worse if I (again, hypothetically) don’t buy a particular brand of peanut butter because I disagree with their animal testing practices (smearing PB in dog’s mouths to test stickiness*) or if I think it’s too sweet? Again, either way they aren’t going to get my money unless they change something they think works for them.
I don’t eat at Chick-fil-a, a stand which is made easier due to their nearly complete lack of presence in my state. I don’t buy pizza from Papa John’s because of the healthcare tantrum but I didn’t buy it before than either. Basically, I let boycotts emerge organically out of my already existant shopping habits.
edit: I get around any “hurting the min. wage employees” feelings by assuming that since I’m rarely not buying stuff but swapping providers, the net number of jobs is the same but pulled ever so slightly toward companies with policies I support.
I have declined lunch invitations to Chick-fil-a a couple of times. I avoid Walmart.
Jenny McCarthy - Never thought much of her anyway, but her misguided loudmouth-ism about autism and against vaccines really make me dislike her.
Tom Cruise - His rants against pharmaceutical treatment of mental and emotional disorders makes me want to avoid giving money to his endeavors. I do believe modern societies over-medicalize normative values and acceptable behaviors, but I’m also well aware that there are, in fact, neurochemical matters that can be treated with chemicals that humans extract and recombine for targeted purposes.
Chick-Fill-A - Not interested in supporting the hater. There’s only one in this region and its not close to my work or home, so that avoidance is easy.
My wife avoids Hooters, saying it is demeaning to women.
Boy Scouts of America - Not interested in the Must-Believe stance or the Anti-Gay stance, neither of which has anything to do with patriotism or being prepared to face various situations in the urbane, rural, or wilderness world. The fact that their homophobic stance currently changing is a positive step, but the strict monotheists-only stance is obnoxiously discriminatory in its antediluvian perspective. I was ostracized out of my cub troop not because I proclaimed atheism or satanism but because my Asian features told them I was obviously a Buddhist and therefore didn’t qualify for their in-group. The only thing I regret is not getting to enter the rubberband-driven airplane races.
Exxon - Never used their stations, but avoided doing so after the Alaskan mess. I was particularly infuriated to learn that, after the investigations and trials determined they were at fault and liable for costs and damages, they paid a bit for costs and stopped. The rest remains unpaid.
Mobile - Used them and loved their little microchipped payment device – then cut up their card and mailed it to them with an explanation (see above) and a request for closure of the account when they merged with Exxon.
BP – good fuel and great prices. I killed my account when my commute route didn’t take me near their stations any more. Their behavior in the Gulf of Mexico ensures I won’t give them my money any more.
–G!
Soon enough, I’m going to be out of food and have no place to get lunch!
I try to… But the reality is most companies are run by rich conservatives who don’t care about the environment nor their employees. The only time they care about a factory where their product is made is when there is bad publicity that can affect their business. People in big business are truly loathsome.
I generally try to support small businesses but those have problems all their own.
Benetton, ever since they had an ad campaign featuring pictures of people on death row. The whole point of the campaign was to make you feel sorry for the people because they’re getting executed.
Hell yeah, I do, all the time. My husband found a great quote about this the other day actually, in a discussion on this topic … let me go find it…here we are.
Every time you spend money, you’re casting a vote for the kind of world you want.
I find that a really empowering thought. Just as the grocery-buyer for a family of five, I’m responsible for a budget of about $10k to $15k every year - and most of the time it’s just me figuring out where I want that money to go. So…who do I support? You can think of it negatively (don’t buy from those scumbags, they’re assholes) or positively (hey! cool company. Let me give you my money!). These days, I much prefer to work positively. I work off the Ethical Consumer Guide a lot - I don’t agree with all the criteria they use to rank companies, but it’s a great jumping board. I shop at the farmer’s market - I feel pretty good about buying from folks who’ve often trucked their own stuff in - certainly a lot less potential for exploitation there.
Even when you’re operating negatively by going on a boycott, the net effect is positive for someone. I’ve been doing the Nestle boycott for a couple of decades, and obviously Nestle isn’t dead yet and isn’t going to be just through me not buying kitkats, but other companies who are at least less-worst have gotten a bunch of my money in the meantime.
In general, though, I think that the best strategy for boycotts is the “short sharp shock”. Punish companies for making particularly assholic moves when they do them. Then get over it. The point is not to, say, destroy BP because they fucked up the Gulf of Mexico by cutting corners. The point is to cause them enough serious pain in the hip pocket that they go “Crap! Better make sure that never happens again!” If enough people did the temporary boycott thing so that their revenues dipped by, say, 10% for a couple of months, and then recovered, I’m pretty sure that would be enough for CEOs to take notice, and make some effort to avoid a repeat performance. And that’s really the point.
This month, I’m not shopping at K-mart and Woolworths, because they won’t sign the agreement about safety conditions in Bangladesh factories. Next month I’ll go back to my normal pattern. Because by then, they’ll either have taken notice or not, but in any case, my dollar would not be sending a message any more. And you can’t boycott everyone who does crappy stuff forever. But the good news is, you don’t really have to.
I’ve never eaten at Chick Fil A so I suppose I don’t know what I’m missing, and though I’ve heard it’s good I just can’t go in there. Plus I usually only find myself around one on a Sunday for some reason so I couldn’t go in even if I wanted to.
I’ve never stepped foot in a Walmart, but primarily because they don’t have any stores near me. I could drive out 20 miles or so and find one, but why?
I myself stayed away from Sony-branded products in the late 80s and early-mid 90s out of disgust for Sony USA’s brand-bullying of Sony Florendo.
That’s really …is “bizarre” the word I’m looking for? Seriously, what the fuck?!