STOP Polarizing Your Customers!!!

I didn't see a suitable business forum where this should go, so I'll just place this right here.


Anyone other than me getting sick and tired of seeing one business after another jumping on the now overflowing anti-Trump bandwagon? I have a suggestion for all of these idiotic big business stances...

SHUT UP ALREADY!

Businesses are supposed to be for the intelligent lot who want to make a living on buying and selling goods. All I see with these crack-pot idiots are business owners who simply want to divide people based on their own political stance. No smart business owner would do this. Why?

Businesses are about making money and offering a service! Not division and opinions!

It's safe to say that at least half of the US voted for Trump. Is it really wise to jump on these bandwagons and purposely piss off half of your dedicated and potential buyers? For example. Lets say that Starbucks put out an Anti-Trump statement or stance , pressing the people to get behind them.... What about all those people who do NOT believe in that stance or statement? They will not likely just ignore it since it IS about them. They will walk away from Starbucks and go somewhere else. So half of their business just went poof. Now I'm not saying that Starbucks customers are 50% Republican (I think they've already upset all of their republican customers a long time ago), but some are at least and those people will go away.

The same is true with every other company that wants to scream for/against one side or the other. Stay the hell out of politics! Support your customers! THAT's who's giving you a paycheck. All this is doing is making businesses in this mix only for customers on one side or the other.

Wait... It's coming... Liberal People Meet .com

Just keep dividing our people down the middle. The next thing we're going to see are big businesses burning to the ground. It wont stop with limos or colleges.

I just dont get why companies want to alienate half of their customers. Why don't you just simply take half of what you earn every year and throw in a barrel and burn it. It's the same thing!

Just keep dividing us in two, will ya. We're not quite dismantled as a people just yet....

Personally I've found all the virtue signalling by Corporate America to be pretty humorous, especially given the reaction to it.

My favorite was the meme about folks in the middle east using their hands instead of toilet paper, and how Starbucks wants to hire people that clean themselves that way.

I chuckled.

You bring up a good point. The quote is "Would you rather be right, or would you rather be rich?" Not sure who said it. I read that somewhere.

If you have a serious issue then go for it. But as a business owner you want to serve everyone. None of my customers know who I voted for...it's none of their business. I serve trump supporters and hillary supporters equally well, even if I disagree with them.

a reply to: StallionDuck

But yet if it's a bakery not baking a cake for gays it's all "well, stop crying and go somewhere else".

I guess you don't see the discrimination unless it bites you in the ass?

You = conservatives

a reply to: Lughnasadh

Was there a lot of mom and pop bakeries going and releasing statements about how they weren't going to bake a cake for somebody? Or was it mostly gay couples going to a bakery and then running to the media?

Because I feel like the OP is mostly decrying Corporate America going and getting all political about things when nobody asked them to.

I just want some coffee. I don't really give a rat's ass what they think about refugees. The difference is that Starbucks felt compelled to tell me how they felt anyway, and those little bakeries you refer to got dragged through the mud by somebody else's hand.

originally posted by: Lughnasadh
a reply to: StallionDuck

But yet if it's a bakery not baking a cake for gays it's all "well, stop crying and go somewhere else".

I guess you don't see the discrimination unless it bites you in the ass?

You = conservatives

The OP wasn't polarized, but you, like the point I'm making, made it polarized.

Who the hell said anything about cakes? There is a difference in who you want to serve based on something you believe in and cutting your customer base in half because of politics. That's fine and dandy if you do but I dont want to hear about it. Did those people find a platform and shout "Not selling cakes to gays today!"? No.. They simply refused the right to not serve certain people based on their beliefs... oh yeah... beliefs that should not be infringed upon.

You want to start a business catered only to liberals and refuse the sale to republicans, be my guest. If you want to do the same against liberals, be my guest. But put it up front then shut your pie hole about it already. It's that simple.


Wondering if I should give you a star for participation....

a reply to: StallionDuck

So it's OK for one to discriminate based on beliefs but not the other?

If you own a business it is wise to not talk politics on a personal basis. Well, I suppose if you are selling custom signs for protests you could agree somewhat with the customer. It is important though to watch what you say to all customers if you want to sell to both sides of the protest.

Keep neutral, this will all blow over eventually and if you get customers who sided with an issue and later decided they do not want anymore of it, they will avoid coming to your business so they won't have to talk to you because you acted radical.

When owning a business it is important to try not to take sides, the radicals are not good long term customers so just treat them with a little respect and change the subject.

Been in business for a long time, politics and religion and sometimes the gay issue are not good discussions no matter what side you support. If they try to start convincing you to to join with them, just try selling them a toilet or snowblower, anything they did not come in there for.

These companies still believe that their virtue signaling is targeted at a "majority". They didn't learn a single thing over the past three months and instead, doubled down believing that what happened here is a fluke.

The big picture has escaped them. They fail to realize, even among the true silent majority (those who chose not to vote at all), the anti-American campaign of the left is viewed as completely disrespectful, childish, and stupid.

Almost every instance of corporate virtue signaling is immediately followed by a dip in their stock values. Still, they miss the big picture.

Some people just want to learn the hard way.

a reply to: StallionDuck

I've seen the social responsibility movement take place in corporate America from within and noticed how it began to bleed into political stances.

The truth is it works for them, if they think it will provide customer loyalty. So I don't see it changing anytime soon.

Personally, I hate the direction it's gone. But it is what it is.

originally posted by: Lughnasadh
a reply to: StallionDuck

So it's OK for one to discriminate based on beliefs but not the other?

Reread the OP and response!

Me: Its not ok to discriminate anyone.... Though that is your right, just shut up about it.

The OP 'seems' one sided to you because of the obvious. The only news I'm seeing about what I'm seeing are ONE SIDED. It's all happening on the liberal side, not the other. That's why YOU perceive it the way you are. If it were happening on the other side, I would be just as sick of it and would say the same thing. I'm an equal opportunist!

Stop reading what you want to read and read what I've said....

a reply to: loam

Yea, I've watched the upper echelon in my company just lose its freaking mind over the failure of TPP. Their corporate mandated training modules have all had a left leaning stance over the last six or so years.

It makes me laugh. We spend more time training on diversity and inclusion than we do on SOP's and things that would actually improve our process. Our Chicago based idiot leadership is truly concerned that we have an inclusion problem in Texas.. My facility is 85% Spanish speaking, with some Germans, and like 4 white people out of a crew of 89... Most of the white people are bilengual.

But we are somehow the ones with an inclusion problem.

I absolutely agree with you that it's a terrible business practice to alienate anyone!

I would definitely welcome anyone to my own business (sure there might be a 1/1000 customer that's too big a jerk to deal with).

Man, people have worked themselves a frenzy over this election. There just seems to be so much at stake.

originally posted by: StallionDuck




There is a difference in who you want to serve based on something you believe in and cutting your customer base in half because of politics.

They simply refused the right to not serve certain people based on their beliefs... oh yeah... beliefs that should not be infringed upon.

I AM reading what you said..

Unless you were trying to say something not written?

originally posted by: StallionDuck

originally posted by: Lughnasadh
a reply to: StallionDuck

So it's OK for one to discriminate based on beliefs but not the other?

Reread the OP and response!

Me: Its not ok to discriminate anyone.... Though that is your right, just shut up about it.

The OP 'seems' one sided to you because of the obvious. The only news I'm seeing about what I'm seeing are ONE SIDED. It's all happening on the liberal side, not the other. That's why YOU perceive it the way you are. If it were happening on the other side, I would be just as sick of it and would say the same thing. I'm an equal opportunist!

Stop reading what you want to read and read what I've said....

I'm not pointing out the "one sided"Ness of the OP.

I'm pointing out the hypocrisy of it.

originally posted by: Lughnasadh
a reply to: StallionDuck

So it's OK for one to discriminate based on beliefs but not the other?

If you are a 16-year-old inner city kid hoping like mad to get that first job to put on your resume and you think a spot at the Starbucks in a local grocery (mass transit goes right to it!) would be perfect ... and then you get your app turned down and find out a couple of weeks later that someone named Tariq who pretty obviously barely speaks English and is ME just started ... what are you going tothink?

Just got discriminated against?

Hmmmm?

No point working a business to make lots of money, if the society that business is in deteriorates to the point that you feel uncomfortable living there.

The reason why we make money is to enjoy the fruits of the environment we live in.

Can't divorce the business from the society.

This is why business speaks out when they see negative things happening in the political scene.

It might seem the business is alienating some of its customers, but in reality the business is optimizing the value of the buck earned.

Starbucks irritates me to no end.

This is like the barristas writing the racial statements on the cups.

If I didn't really like the gals who work at the one in my grocery store, I would mostly stop buying coffee from them entirely.

originally posted by: ketsuko
Starbucks irritates me to no end.
If I didn't really like the gals who work at the one in my grocery store, I would mostly stop buying coffee from them entirely.

Well, when you grow up , you can go to Hooters and order a beer, you'll like the gals there even more.

a reply to: AMPTAH

Ummm, you do realize that I am a middle aged woman and mother right?

I like the gals who work the Starbucks at my local grocery because they are genuinely nice people. They've stood me a coffee a time or two when times have been tough (car repair, personal crisis, etc.) and I've taken them Christmas cookies and tip well. They also know what we like to order and who we are.