Companies ponder how to defend against Anti-Republican Backlash

[Ian David]

April 26, 2005
An Little Known Meeting and Other Updates

The California Chamber of Commerce is holding a rather innocuous sounding conference this week which ends tomorrow called the "Advocacy Council Members Only: Spring Retreat." I heard through the rumormill that one of the topics of discussion during this meeting is how companies can defend themselves against campaigns like BuyBlue.

Now I don't know whether they spent 2 hours on this or 2 minutes, but that is sort of irrelevant in my opinion. If we have managed to get on the radar of the Chamber of Commerce as something worth discussing strategy on, that means one thing - every one of us that has written a letter, sent a fax, made a phone call or switched because of the ratings presented here deserves a pat on the back. That means companies are not only listening but they are at least mildly concerned. At this point in our evolution I'll consider "mildly concerned" an accomplishment.

I would have liked to speak at this function but unfortunately it wouldn't have been possible due to things going on with my day job. However, I have thought a little bit about what I'd say given the opportunity. I won't write out some long speech here, but the answer is pretty simple - get out of politics. Every company out there wants to bring as many loyal consumers as possible into the fold. Therefore, I think that many companies will someday realize that it doesn't pay to buy politicians and risk alienating potentially half of their consumer base. Until that day comes, we'll continue to shop our politics as much as possible.

The other big news item is that we are currently working on putting together our approach for local companies. It is too soon to really divulge many details there but with any luck you'll see this before the end of 2005. You'll definitely be hearing more about it in the coming weeks and months.

Finally, I wanted to list a the updates since the last time I posted them. I'll keep the snark to a minimum tonight since I'm a little wrecked after a long day and too much time spent in an airport or in the air. So here they are.

Quiznos, Caribou Coffee Company (100% blue), Menard's, 7-Eleven, Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company, Goodrich Corporation, Elephant Bar.

I did want to say something about Comcast. Based on these numbers they do make for an alternative to SBC for internet service. Here in the bay area they have been running a pretty agressive campaign to get people to switch from DSL (cable modem service was not previously available in many areas), so it is a good opportunity to send a message.

Overstock.com, Abercrombie & Fitch, RE/MAX International (if you want to see why campaign finance reform is important check out their soft money contributions from previous years), Dollar Tree Stores, Xerox, H&R Block, Allstate, Bob Evans Farms (Mimi's Cafe).

What's in your wallet? Hopefully not a Capital One card. Send that card back to them in a letter in little pieces and switch over to a Visa or American Express card instead.

That's all for tonight. What's on your mind?

Posted by Raven at April 26, 2005 11:52 PM

More:
http://www.buyblue.org/archives/2005/04/an_little_known.html#more