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Coca-Cola, Hershey's, Starbucks: More Major Advertisers Are Now Boycotting Facebook (usatoday.com) 228

Posted by EditorDavid from the bigger-boycotts dept.
Some of America's biggest brands — Coca-Cola, The Hershey Company and the Levi Strauss & Co. — "are among the latest in pledging to halt advertising on Facebook as part of a growing boycott," reports USA Today: Despite Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg outlining several steps the social network will take to combat hate speech ahead of the 2020 presidential election Friday, the companies joined Unilever, Honda, Verizon and others in the protest... Jen Sey, chief marketing officer of Levi's, said in a statement late Friday the company was pausing all paid Facebook and Instagram advertising globally at least through the end of July across all of its brands. "When we re-engage will depend on Facebook's response," Sey said. The ad boycott on Facebook focuses on advertising for the month of July and also includes Eddie Bauer and Ben & Jerry's... Patagonia, REI, Mozilla and Upwork in addition to about 100 smaller companies also have said they are committed.

Nearly all of the social media company's revenue comes from advertising on Facebook and Instagram. Shares of Facebook dropped more than 8% on Friday.
Business Insider notes that the 8% drop in Facebook's stock price meant that Mark Zuckerberg's fortune dropped $7.21 billion in a single day.

And then Sunday Starbucks announced they were also taking action, suspending advertising on all social media because "we believe both business leaders and policy makers need to come together to affect real change."

UPDATE: It's also now being reported that even Pepsi is joining the boycott.
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Coca-Cola, Hershey's, Starbucks: More Major Advertisers Are Now Boycotting Facebook More

Coca-Cola, Hershey's, Starbucks: More Major Advertisers Are Now Boycotting Facebook

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  • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @02:41PM (#60238922)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Cylix ( 55374 )

      It's called blood in the water.

      Advertisers know they can lower the costs of ads if they find a means to collectively bargain under some label. This is what has transpired under the last several invocations of this non-sense and it just means lower ad rates for advertisers in the end.

      The original pause had a point, that no matter what you say, everyone will hate you. It is partially true that the market is extremely polarized. There is a vocal minority making a lot of waves, but the actual buyers haven't shi

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by gtall ( 79522 )

        "never let a good crisis go to waste!" Whatever gave people thought that this was a good idea. The alleged administration attempted to ride the virus pandemic and managed to drive themselves straight into a ditch. The important point is that one must be competent before risking to manage a crisis for their own benefit.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by rtb61 ( 674572 )

        In the end, the advertisers have no choice, they have to go where the eyeballs are and the reality, the less advertising there the more the end users will use it, people are sick of advertising which is why streaming services do so well.

        So where are the advertisers going to advertise instead, huh, it's like a massive joke on themselves. They don't advertise, people stop buying their crap.

        Either this is simple a corporate cabal move to give Facebook an excuse for mass censorship and force it on your dumb sc

      • Re:SJW blitzkrieg (Score:4, Informative)

        by Actually, I do RTFA ( 1058596 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @10:45PM (#60240316)

        eanwhile, the platform skews in all kinds of directions to make accommodations that could have been appeased if they just lowered the rates outright.

        What the fuck are you talking about? FB doesn't set the rates at all. They auction off the ads.

    • Indeed, in the USA it's better to side with the rebellious majority, or you might be stoned to death.

  • They're just getting priced out of the market (Score:4, Interesting)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @02:44PM (#60238936)
    by the political adverts. It's an election year. This gets them some good press for something they were going to do anyway.

    • Re:They're just getting priced out of the market (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gbjbaanb ( 229885 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @05:19PM (#60239416)

      And the virus has shuttered a load of their stores anyway, so ads like "come to starbucks, but we're closed or limiting access" are pointless, and a lot of these advertisers will be trying every way to save money because they've had little to none coming in for the last month or so. Given the choice of not spending on advertising for a while, or accessing their credit facilities which will send shudders through their shareholders, its an easy choice to make.

      The line about hate speech is just some waffle to make a pretend justiciation.

    • by the political adverts. It's an election year. This gets them some good press for something they were going to do anyway.

      Facebook's ad revenue is $17.44 billion. [techcrunch.com] Of that, political ads constitute $796.8 million, [emarketer.com] or 4% of total ad revenue.

      I'll leave it to the reader to determine whether political ads can actually have a measurable effect on facebook's pricing.

  • Good deal (Score:3)

    by fred911 ( 83970 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @02:46PM (#60238944) Journal

    Just because a platform has a shitton of eyes, doesn't make those eyes of any value without ads. Monetization of the user concentration is what makes those eyes valuable.

    Everyone should vote with their cash. Don't participle in any fauna you disagree in principal or specificity with the usage of the cash use produce. Kudos for corps that do the same.

  • Opportunity. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Gravis Zero ( 934156 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @02:48PM (#60238958)

    There is a short window of time in which a facebook competitor could at the very least give facebook a good scare. All they really need to do is claim to be better and they might be able to land some of these megacorps as sponsors and then really expand their network.

    I have no doubt that these megacorps will silently go back to facebook by the year's end because this is all about PR.

  • Cess Pool (Score:4, Insightful)

    by battingly ( 5065477 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @02:52PM (#60238962)
    Nobody would want to run an advertisement on a billboard for their business when that billboard was located in the town cess pool. Twitter and facebook have become the town cess pool.

    • > Nobody would want to run an advertisement on a billboard for their business when that billboard was located in the town cess pool. Twitter and facebook have become the town cess pool.

      I object to this analogy; Cesspools serve the important function of containing and ultimately digesting humans waste, making it safer for the environment.

      Facebook is more like a broken perssurized sewer main dumping into the street... just a geyser of shit gushing everywhere.
      =Smidge=

      • I object to this analogy. Shit is capable of being used to fertilise. Facebook and Twitter are geysers of radioactive thallium.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by sfcat ( 872532 )

          I object to this analogy. Shit is capable of being used to fertilise. Facebook and Twitter are geysers of radioactive thallium.

          Thallium isn't naturally radioactive. Its poisonous, isn't that good enough?

  • The problem Facebook has is (Score:3, Insightful)

    by oldgraybeard ( 2939809 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @02:59PM (#60238990)
    no one except family's for family photos and info really need anything Facebook provides.

    Not sure how Facebook and Twitter ever got in the same sentence as hard news. They are in no way stable providers of news. They provide targeted Advertising and Sponsored propaganda for their approved progressive causes and customers.

    Just my 2 cents ;)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by DogDude ( 805747 )
      Nobody needs professional sports, either, but it's a huge advertising platform.

      What sentence are you talking about where Facebook and Twitter were called "hard news"?

      • Professional motor racing is still a major area of research and development in the field of high precision, high tolerance engineering.

        Professional sailing has resulted in astonishing advances in low-drag materials.

        Other sports you may have a point, but in at least these two cases, it is justifiable to say that we have indeed benefited outside of mere entertainment.

  • There is no such thing as hate speech. There is hateful speech, but another word for that is freedom of speech. Don't get me wrong, FB is a dumpster fire and I'm no fan of Zuck. But all these companies showing their true colors, getting on board with this intersectional, wokism mindvirus, is good. Now I know who to avoid. I'm tired of giving my money to companies that don't understand basic human rights, including unfettered, unlimited, absolute free speech. Full stop.
    • How can you be for freedom of speech but- somehow be against someone elseâ(TM)s? You want to force someone else to give money to a platform ? Because why? Free speech? Please explain this logic to me...

      • What are you talking about? You're saying that not giving money to people that say stuff you don't like is somehow anti-free-speech. I have a list of people for you to give money to, btw.

      • They use their freedom of speech (and capital) to champion a system that is antithetical to the system that has allowed them to flourish. They are all private companies and welcome to do and speak as they see fit. "I" am not withdrawing my support of their abilty to speak their minds freely. I am withdrawing my support of their companies because THEY choose to support the suppression of free speech. See the difference? You can do with your dollars as you please. As for mine, I will not buy another of

        • my displeasure of their anti-freedom stance

          Companies exercising their freedom of speech to not support ideas opposing equality? Yeah, very anti-freedom. I get it though, you do you.

    • What people colloquially refer to as free speech does not mean what you think it means. There are plenty of restrictions beyond hate speech, such as libel and slander and speech which could lead to imminent lawless action. These are well established and noncontroversial within our legal system, although the scope of these laws are often challenged over time. Your romantic notion of unlimited free speech has never existed, and for good reason.

      • Yeah, but since I can assume you're a Brit, the US has way freer speech than the UK. Or anywhere else in the world that I'm aware of.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by dryeo ( 100693 )

          Listening to DJ a while back bitching about the limitations of being broadcast in America as he was interviewing a band called the fuckheads or such and how careful he had to be with what he said. He also stated that there had never been a complaint from a Canadian about saying fuck, shit or such on national radio.
          Seems America is pro free asshole speech but very anti sex free speech. Shit look at the fuss about Janet Jackson's nip slip and the long history of obscenity laws.
          Then there are the steady attack

          • Listening to DJ a while back bitching about the limitations of being broadcast in America as he was interviewing a band called the fuckheads or such and how careful he had to be with what he said. He also stated that there had never been a complaint from a Canadian about saying fuck, shit or such on national radio.

            Yeah, that's bullshit. I'm Canadian; we have similar rules about obscenity in broadcasting and plenty of busybodies who will whine about a "bad word" on the radio.

            Then there are the steady attacks on freedom of association, how many nationalities are Americans banned from associating with?

            Zero.

            Try going to Cuba and talking to some Cubans and you will learn how much freedom you have.

            You can say the same thing about talking to North Koreans. If you think that this is a persuasive point, you're delusional. If you talk to Cubans or North Koreans in America, they'll tell you all about what a brutal oppressive shitshow the country they escaped from is. If you talk to Cubans or North Koreans inside their respective countri

        • But it doesn't.

          Freedom is always zero sum.

          By freeing the speech of the loudest, you've stifled the speech of the quietest. They don't get free speech in America.

          In Europe, nobody gets the highs, but then far fewer get the lows. The nomads do, but the bulk of people have REAL free speech, rather than the minority as in America.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by raynet ( 51803 )

          You must not be aware of many countries then...

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ranton ( 36917 )

          Yeah, but since I can assume you're a Brit, the US has way freer speech than the UK. Or anywhere else in the world that I'm aware of.

          Nope, US citizen, and everything I said applies to US laws. I don't know enough about the free speech laws of other countries to comment on whether the US has the free-est speech, and I couldn't find any good data to support that statement either way with a quick Google search. I did find research [weforum.org] supporting that US citizens appear to be the most supportive of free speech compared to other countries, although plenty of other European and North American countries scored nearly as high.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by ZombieCatInABox ( 5665338 )

      Next time your daughter goes to a movie, I'll make sure to be there and yell "Fire !" in the crowded theatre.

      If your daughter dies trampled in the panic, and I'm ever charged for it. I'll expect you to testify in my defense in court, claiming that I should have had every legal right to do what I did, because freedom of speech should be "unfettered, unlimited and absolute". Full stop.

      But we all know that you won't do that. So you're just full of shit.

      • You have the right to say what you want - including shouting "FIRE!" in a crowded theater. You are also responsible for the actions directly related to your speech. I don't see how that is at all controversial (unless you believe people should be exempt from the consequences of their actions because #LatestProgressiveMeme).

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by MobyDisk ( 75490 )

        I should have had every legal right to do what I did, because freedom of speech should be "unfettered, unlimited and absolute". Full stop.

        I see your confusion. So lets eliminate speech from your example to prevent the confusion.

        We have the right to swing swords around if we want to. But if I swing the sword and stab someone, then I have committed a crime. It's not the swinging of the sword that's the crime, it's the stabbing. Similarly, the second amendment protects the right to bear arms. So we have the right to buy a gun and discharge it. But if I fire it at someone's head, I may have committed a crime. The second amendment doesn't p

    • You people think big business wants democrats in power? Whatever they're doing, its pro Trump to get a corporate tax cut.

      • Trump is bad for business. Too much uncertainty. Taxes aren't an issue since they offshore most of it.

        It's international trade that matters. Deregulating is bad for international trade. Nonsensical showmanship with North Korea and China is bad for international trade. Interfering with Europe is terrible for international trade.

        They also care about the virus - dead employees can't work or pass on knowledge. Sick employees can't be in trade delegations. That hurts the bottom line.

        Big business cares about thes

  • Give in. "Donate" $100 million to some SJW organization and write it off. It is a business expense. Paying off the SJW is just another line item. Google fixed racism by doing that early on.

    • Worked for Seattle, they ended the CHOP/CHAZ by promising them $20 million to a committee that they could sit on, to do with what they pleased.

      Oh, and the Seattle PD budget was reduced by $20 million, surely coincidentally.

  • Hit him where it hurts (Score:3)

    by fahrbot-bot ( 874524 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @03:04PM (#60239010)

    Hit him in the wallet. I would have said "balls" if Mark Zuckerberg had any -- I think Jack Dorsey stole them, but I haven't actually checked.

  • I've said this before - ad revenue is literally the only thing that Facebook will pay attention to. This is the ONLY thing that would change behavior. Well, I take that back. Congress could pass laws to control corporate behavior or put in place legally-mandatory regulation. That would also do the trick, but with the current leadership in the US, that's not going to happen. Right now, companies could probably harvest their employees organs and mostly get away with it. Our elected leaders would find some way

  • SJW money will be diverted from one SJW company, Facebook, to other SJW companies. Names are changed, it all remains the same.

    When FB finally dies it'll be entirely replaced by some other SJW company someone is building in their living room right now. And life goes on.

  • Does social media advertising even work? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ErichTheRed ( 39327 ) on Sunday June 28, 2020 @03:30PM (#60239068)

    It seems like these big companies, who are usually scared to death of doing anything first, decided enough of their competitors made the leap. This is the same reason why working conditions never improve in IT unless you work at a tech company -- companies don't want to make their employees' lives better if their competitors don't because then their costs will be higher.

    What I wonder is whether advertising on social media (or anywhere for that matter) actually works. Maybe it works for dumb people or easily influenced people...but I've never bought anything based on an advertisement. I wouldn't think most people would be inclined to believe any claims put forth in an ad....after all it's pretty obvious that they're manipulating you into thinking a certain way.

    Unfortunately, social media is probably "too big to fail" at this point. Even if all the large advertisers left, the platform will still be in place. The attraction to business owners is too great...Facebook and the like promise to put your ad in front of exactly the people you want to trick into buying whatever it is you're selling. I really wish these companies would just go away though...they're slowly destroying society by letting all the online crazies rally together around whatever cause they're looking for, then trapping them in an echo chamber by only showing them things they like and agree with.

    • Things can change on a dime. Facebook doesn't provide anything new, except everything in one place. There are other social networks like MeWe which provide everything Facebook does, and don't have the bad reputation. There was a time when MySpace ruled the roost, and Facebook was just for college people.

      Even with Facebook still the main social network, there are many other places people go, be it Discord, Telegram, Signal, or others.

      Facebook will evolve, or people will move on, and FB will wind up in the

    • If social-media advertising didn't work, then companies wouldn't use it. Companies, especially big ones, are careful about where they spend advertising dollars. They know how to measure success.

      I don't think social media is too big to fail. Rather, it's too cheap to fail. Their product is us and they get it essentially for free.

      • I read an article about a year ago where a data scientist persuaded his company to halt their hundred million advertising campaigns and showed that it made no difference, that just saved the money. The people pushing back were in marketing who just couldn't accept that what they did was pointless. Wish I could find the link, but in any case, I would bet a lot of advertising is driven by people whose job depends on it so they're going to justify that spending no matter what.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Halo1 ( 136547 )

      A lot of internet advertising . [thecorrespondent.com]

      The article explains a lot of it comes down to the selection effect. This is basically the fraction of people that would have gone to the page your ad links even if they hadn't seen your ad. And here's the funny thing with targeted advertising: the better you can target people likely interested in what you're advertising, the higher the chances are that they would have looked for it of their own accord! However, if you just look at click-through rates, you'll never know that.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Halo1 ( 136547 )

        Damn, should've actually looked at the preview. The first sentence should have read: "A lot of internet advertising doesn't work [thecorrespondent.com]".

  • Hiding a problem through censorship has never solved the problem, only made it worse.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by hey! ( 33014 )

      Except this isn't censorship. It's companies freely deciding they'd be better off not advertising on Facebook. In turn Facebook will freely choose whatever editorial policy makes them the most money.

      The real problem here is that too many people use Facebook.

  • Facebook dropped more than 8% on Friday.

    This means a whole lot of nothing. Twitter dropped 7%, are they boycotting them too?

  • If cost of advertising goes down. I think FB is useless for advertising unless your bug and tons of followers for me becoming a vendor or sponsor on community forums has brought in actual sales with in 4 months to off set the $400 I spend per month vs how much I spent on FB and all I fucking got was likes and seemed like 1/5th were fake as lots kept on disappearing after a few months.

    Also with forums you get a way more closer connection to your business if you give back knowledge to the forums users.

  • Hershey is advertising what? Not chocolates, I hope ; they're the worst "chocolates" I ever ate. Even Singapore does better.

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