If say the KKK decided to have pens made to be handed out as a promotion to join could the company that makes the pens prevent them from having the KKK use their pens? Is there any kind of agreement that has to be made when a company or group puts their information on promotional items?
If World Kitsch & Promotions accepts the orders from the KKK and uses pens that they have in stock, the manufacturer has no way to prevent it.
If this became a regular sale, and Joe’s Best Pens Mfg. decided that they did not want the KKK glurge showing up on pens they manufactured, they could go to World Kitsch & Promotions and say “If you accept any more KKK orders, we will no longer sell you pens.” World Kitsch & Promotions would then need to look around and find a new supplier or drop the KKK sale.
It is unlikely that Joe’s Best Pens Mfg. has any restrictions in its current contracts with World Kitsch & Promotions. It would probably be legal to write such things into the contracts, but it would be very unlikely.
The closest real-life parallel I can think of involves several Arab countries and manufacturers selling to Israel. There are Arab nations who will boycott companies doing business in Israel, but they rarely attempt to write language to enforce their boycott; they simply tell the vendor that they will cancel their purchases if they discover an Israeli customer. For big ticket items, (airplanes, etc.) such threats are not very effective, since dropping Israel as a customer will cause the vendor more lost sales in sympathy cancellations from the U.S. and Europe than they can make up in Arab state sales.
Depends, does the company that makes the pens, also print the pens. For example, Bic Graphic does all printing on Bic pens–they will not sell/ship completely blank pens (Bic pens that you would buy in the store have the Bic name and logo where printing on a custom-printed pen would be), so they would have complete control of what is printed on their pens (this is done for quality purposes–they don’t want someone to buy blank Bic pens and have someone stick a shoddy printing job on something with their logo on it). For a company that merely manufactures the item and then sells it to another company who does custom printing on them, they would have much less control over what is printed on them. It would be the printer who has control over what gets printed in that case, absent any prior agreement with the manufacturer.
Long ago and far away, I worked for a company that printed business cards and other stationery, as well as wedding invitations, as a trade service for small print shops. That way the smaller shops could offer a wider selection than if they did the printing on-site.
So one day this order comes in from a customer in
Alabama, or Arkansas, somewhere down south who hardly ever ordered anything on a regular basis.
It was a business card order for the local Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. Had a little line drawing of a hooded guy riding a horse on one side.
The boss sent it back with a short note saying that the order could not be filled. And he signed his name.
“Myron Cohen”
The moral of this story is: Management Reserves the Right to Refuse Service to Anyone.