While vocal support for the Black Lives Matter movement continues – witness the latest McDonald’s ad – brands and agencies are also beginning to offer financial donations to organisations that can help fight discrimination on the ground.
A new ad from McDonald’s – famously one of President Trump’s preferred fast-food options – does both as it remembers seven black American victims of police brutality and gun violence.
Black Lives Matter
This article is part of an ongoing WARC series focused on educating brand marketers on diversity and activism, in light of the recent progressive steps made with the Black Lives Matter movement.
“They were all one of us,” the McDonald’s ad reads. “We see them in our customers. We see them in our crew members. We see them in our franchisees. And this is why the entire McDonald’s family grieves.
“It’s why we stand for them and any other victims of systematic oppression and violence,” the ad continues. “Today we stand with black communities across America. Which is why we’re donating to the National Urban League and the NAACP. We do not tolerate inequity, injustice or racism.”
The donation amounts to $1 million, AdWeek reported.
Similarly, Visa has announced it will double employee donations to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, ACLU and National Urban League during June, up to $1 million, as part of a five-point action plan to “help stop discrimination and racial injustice in America”.
It is also creating a $10 million scholarship fund for Black and African American students, which will feed into a guaranteed job opportunity with the financial services business on graduation.
Elsewhere, creative agency Taylor has stepped up its existing partnerships with black community groups, including a $50,000 donation to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to support policing reform efforts as well as $100,000 in strategic and creative services throughout 2020.
“We’re not just going to talk about these things,” Taylor CEO Tony Signore told AdWeek. “We need to demonstrate the action that is required by all of us.”
The publication suggested that the protests that have swept the US and beyond over the past week “have instigated what appears to be a corporate sea change, causing executive leadership to closely examine both workforce makeup and what they can do to help fight systemic racism in America”.
Sourced from AdWeek
