Some retailers’ efforts now include Gay Pride Month ads and events

Columbus Dispatch ^ | June 15 2012 | Tim Feran

[scottjewell]

Retailers are going mainstream with ad campaigns aimed at gay customers in an effort to get their merchandise into more consumer closets.

“Retailers, particularly fashion retailers, always like to be ahead of the curve,” said local retail analyst Chris Boring of Boulevard Strategies. “In 2012, supporting gay rights and accepting gays is pretty mainstream.”

In one high-profile move, J.C. Penney is running an ad for Father’s Day featuring a gay Texas couple and their two children. A month ago, the retailer had an ad for Mother’s Day showing a lesbian couple with their children. The iconic retailer also has tapped openly gay comedian and talk show host Ellen DeGeneres as a company spokeswoman.

Macy’s, meanwhile, is marking June, Gay Pride month, with special in-store events, special merchandise and active support of parades around the country.

They join a who’s who of other big-name retailers — including Limited Brands, Abercrombie & Fitch and Target — sponsoring local Gay Pride parades and touting their companies as gay-friendly.

The change is driven as much by changing views as it is by the profit motive.

A recent Pew Research Center survey found a dramatic shift in public opinion. In 2004, 60 percent of the American public opposed gay marriage, and only 29 percent supported it. Today, approval of gay marriage tops 40 percent, and among young people born after 1980, support for gay marriage is over 60 percent.

“There’s a dramatic difference among age groups,” Boring said. “That’s important. From a retailer’s standpoint, they’re going to connect with younger customers and that’s what Penney’s is trying to do. They’re trying to burnish their brand as being progressive and leading edge.”

There is big money at stake in gaining that image, too, said Matt Wilson of SBC Advertising.

“Depending on what report you read, ... (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) buying power in America ranges anywhere from $850 million to $2 trillion annually,” Wilson said. Compared with the average consumer, this group” is twice as likely to have graduated from college, twice as likely to have per capita income of $60,000-plus and twice as likely to have household income exceeding $250,000."

“In an economy in which the mainstream customer is losing buying power, the LGBT public becomes a valuable and easily activated supplement, ff only you’ve got the guts to acknowledge it positively and publicly,” Wilson said.

There are consequences, he noted, because those who run such ads often “wind up on a conservative mom group’s hit list.”

“The American Family Association’s ‘One Million Moms’ group, for example, has expressed disapproval of some companies’ efforts to reach out to the gay community.

Penney’stook some heat for its Father’s Day ad.

“One Million Moms is disturbed that J.C. Penney's is continuing down the same path of promoting sin in their advertisements,” the group said in a statement issued soon after the ad rolled out. “Scripture says multiple times that homosexuality is wrong, and God will not tolerate this sinful nature.”

Penney’s also endured criticism from that group for using DeGeneres in its ads. But a Penney’s spokeswoman said the company stands by her.

“We are extremely proud to have her on our team,” said Penney’s spokeswoman Kate Coultas.

Some retailers are going beyond marketing in to the demographic in general and are specifically acknowledging “pride” month by selling special T-shirts and other merchandise.

Macy’s, for example, has a “Pride + Joy” campaign that features merchandise, in-store fashion events, commemorative advertising and gift registry booths for same-sex couples.

Others, such as Abercrombie & Fitch, eschew such special offerings, preferring to show their support in their everyday business dealings with customers and employees.

“For us, it means a whole integration of policy,” said Todd Corley, Abercrombie’s vice president of diversity. “For me, the most important thing is when an employee asks, ‘What do you do for me as a person?’ I can tell you. You can see a shirt, but are we holding people accountable?”

The trendy retailer is a founding partner of the European Diversity Awards, which recognize those who foster the embrace of people of all kinds and abilitiesas well as a lead sponsor in the “ Who’s Who in GLBT in Columbus” book.

“We seek out opportunities wherever we are,” Corley said.

Whether companies produce T-shirt and sponsor parades or not, “The public declaration of support is the thing,” Wilson said. “It’s a legitimizing force in a consumer-fueled culture. The LBGT community is a brand loyal consumer base who are willing and able to shell out a little more for a product and service because a company has decided to side with the community. ”

As this year’s Columbus gay-pride activities take place today and Saturday, corporate support of this demographic is becoming more and more the norm, said Karla Rothan, executive director of Stonewall Columbus.

“None of our businesses want people to think they’re not inclusive. (Support of the parade) is a perfect way to show they welcome our business and they welcome our talent.”

[reg45]

See #18.

[what's up]

The slots of many top jobs at the fashion industries currently are occupied by gays.

Sarah Jessica Parker and Vogue joined forces to have an Obama fund-raiser the other day, to promote the power of the current fashion power-houses which are largely gay-oriented.

I do believe that if Romney wins in Nov. some of these people will have seen their best days behind them. Thus, the current move to push their power to the max before they are decimated by a possibly coming tsunami i.e. major fashion changes if conservatives start winning the culture wars.

[scottjewell]

I hope you are right. I myself am not so sure Romney is in any way a cultural conservative: The Mitt Romney Deception--- Despite recent statements across the country by Governor Mitt Romney claiming he's pro-life, pro-family and a committed conservative, a broad investigation of his actual statements, actions, and public positions over the years indicates that he has spent his entire career speaking and governing as a liberal - and that his new found conversion to conservatism very likely coincides with his candidacy for the presidency.. .. One of the few conservative publications to expose Romney's liberalism is the conservative weekly Human Events which (in a 2005 article) listed Romney at number eight on its list of "Top Ten Republicans in Name Only (RINOs)." Indeed, this report will demonstrate that Romney was probably the most pro-abortion and pro-gay rights Republican official in the nation for the last decade. The idea that he has suddenly become a conservative after a decade of liberal actions and statements would be merely amusing were it not for the fact that he's running for the presidency and that many conservatives are falling for this act. http://massresistance.org/docs/marriage/romney/record/

[what's up]

I think Romney could have hemmed and hawed when asked the gay marriage question. He didn't. He came out with a black and white answer. Man and women.

He's not the Hollyweird and fashion industry hob-nobber that Obama is. Even if he turns out not to be the conservative some think he is, he's not the freakshow we currently have.

And the people who have gained power under Obama's freakshow are screaming and grasping now because they know their days are numbered.

[scottjewell]

Maybe you are right. I sure hope so. ;)

[wayoverthehill]

Marshall Field’s was THE store when I was growing up in Chicago. They had everything! And if they didn’t have it, you didn’t really need it. I was thrilled when they came to Texas but the store here was but a pale imitation of the original so I wasn’t too broken up when they withdrew from the DFW market.

Macy’s took over Foley’s, which had taken over Titche’s or Sanger-Harris (can’t exactly remember - it’s been so long ago). Didn’t know Field’s was part of that group so that’s interesting to learn.

[maxwellsmart_agent]

J C Penny and others will do this until it costs them financially. Then they will stop. Just watch!

[reg45]

Marshall Field and Company

[a fool in paradise]

The same Leftist infested corporations that refuse to recognize Christmas, instead referring it to a “holiday season” that ends on December 26th, BEFORE the New Year’s holiday.

Screw politically correct liberal red diaper doper baby bastards.

[a fool in paradise]

“Depending on what report you read, ... (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) buying power in America ranges anywhere from $850 million to $2 trillion annually,” Wilson said. Compared with the average consumer, this group” is twice as likely to have graduated from college, twice as likely to have per capita income of $60,000-plus and twice as likely to have household income exceeding $250,000."

and four times more likely to have a sex dungeon.

[fwdude]

Ellen is the face of the radical homosexual agenda. Anything with her face on it is understood to be about the sodomites.

[a fool in paradise]

Then they will ask for a government bailout.

The corporations went politically correct and corrupt in the last generation.

Corporations push the liberal agenda on employees (diversity training can include promotion of the homosexual agenda as well as information sessions on greenie weenie global warming scares).

They wonder why they are not as productive, because they were subverted within by those seeing re-education centers that do not benefit the bottom line. It’s about a socialist agenda, not productivity.

[wayoverthehill]

Thanks! That was a very interesting read. Sounds like a lot of Chicagoans are still holding a grudge about the changeover to Macy’s. I suppose if I still lived in Chicago I would be among them.

In the meantime, I have great memories of Saturday shopping trips and lunches with my Mom. It was a tradition with us.

[Anima Mundi]

You are right, but it is daunting to think of thirty years. And it will take something really dramatic to ignite the enthusiasm. I can’t even imagine what it would be. Perhaps the batch of “home schooled” kids coming to maturity will be independent thinking, smart and able to move things. It does not take a lot of people. We have to realize that a small vocal, determined group wins the day.

[beelzepug]

Macy’s took over the Bon Marche, too. I have not shopped there since. Interesting that their logo is a big, red star.

[scottjewell]

I think you may have hit the nail on the head with the idea of home schooled kids arriving at maturity. Plus, Christian kids who went to public schools, and sat in silence as the indoctrination took place (who will now say, “Did you think we weren’t watching, and arriving at our own conclusions?”).

Thanks to all for reading, and for posting comments. I believe this is one of those “it has to get worse to get better” situations. As we hit rock bottom culturally, we can only go up.

[scottjewell]

Unfortunately, Romney does hide his pro-gay past:

http://dailydish.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451c45669e20162ff58753c970d-300wi

[scottjewell]

All one has to do is listen to this exchange between a shareholder with over 720,000 signatures pleading with Home Depot to stay neutral regarding the gay agenda (get that, he was only being asked to remain NEUTRAL, not to take an antigay stance) and the response and you can see that the Left has totally, totally won the culture wars:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlUjAVnJNNs&feature=youtu.be