Name: Why Ben & Jerry's has been so outspoken after George Floyd's death
Uploaded: 2020-06-22
Duration: 9 min 1 s
Description: Global Activism Manager Chris Miller says corporations have a duty to provide leadership.

Global Activism Manager Chris Miller says corporations have a duty to provide leadership.

Why Ben & Jerry's has been so outspoken after George Floyd's death

Ben & Jerry's statement after George Floyd's death

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Corporations have a duty to provide leadership.

Ben & Jerry's powerful statement after George Floyd's death

One of the main reasons that we're talking today is George Floyd statement that Ben and Jerry's put out what really struck me is a lot of companies put out a statement. Some of them were pretty generic. Yours was really to the point and sharp, um, tell us a little bit how that came about. We set off on this work specifically focused on issues of of of racial justice about five years ago, in about two years ago, we took on the issue of criminal justice reform. It seemed like a A really interesting opportunity for us as a company, that is, if I'm honest, were mostly white company in a mostly white state. I think there are moments when it feels like it's important simply to go on record to stand and be counted. And I think the events of the last couple of weeks brought us to a place where we felt like we as a company, given the work that we've been doing, understanding the work that needs to be done, had to go on record and talk about these issues of white supremacy and police brutality and structural racism, and that, you know, sort of thoughts and prayers and messages of unity are not really sufficient, uh, anymore. And we need to talk about our history, how it relates to the present so that we can build a more just and equitable future. Do you see this as a broader shift within corporate America where companies do feel like they need to now weigh in on social issues? Or does this feel just like a little bit of anomaly? And it'll be back to business as usual for most companies. I do think there is this push around businesses with purpose, and you see more and more companies sort of engaging in this space, some more authentically and others some doing it better than others. And so I do think it is a trend, sort of what that means for the future and how impactful that will be. I'm not sure, although, you know, I do think that it is a largely positive development that more companies are willing to kind of step into this space. Look, the truth is, corporations are the most powerful entities in society. Right? Centuries ago, it was the church. 100 years ago it was it was national governments and today for better, for worse. And it's often for worse. Corporations are the most powerful entities within society. If some of these corporations would be willing and able to match there sort of the words that they stay publicly with their willingness to use their government affairs team and their lobbying power to promote these policies with policymakers, because I think that that could be tremendously influential in making some change. Is there anything that you got pushed back on from management or you're outside partners or, UM, anything that you thought you might get pushed back on that actually did sell through the process. I'll be perfectly transparent with you. There was a fair bit of discussion around. How directly do we want to engage around the Trump administration? You know, the president has proved himself to be largely irrelevant on these issues. He has not been a unifying force on these issues. He has used his platform and and his social media channels to promote racist nationalist messages. It is important that Americans here from leaders and respected companies and business leaders that that his approach to this is not okay, so I mean, that's one area where there was a little bit of discussion. But, you know, in the end, I think we all agreed was their concern at all about alienating a part of the customer states that might disagree with you on that. Our former CBO yellowstain Solheim was fond of saying, The more people we piss off, the more ice cream we saw. Obviously, that's not at all why we do these things. But, you know, we have grown this business year over year for 42 years, it started in a gas station in downtown Burlington, renowned 40 countries around the world. Like, you know, might we have been bigger if we didn't do these things? Perhaps. But you know, we we are one of the most well known ice cream brands on the planet, and and so this idea that doing having the courage and being bold and and doing this kind of work is detrimental to your business clearly is not the case. The company's history, as it relates to advocacy and activism, is deeply rooted in our co founders there. They have a very strong set of values as individuals. Uh, they are quite progressive, and there's a quote that we often cite from them that the strongest bonds that you can create with your customers is around a shared set of values. And so by using the business as a way to advance his own values and support progressive social change, it also builds an incredibly loyal fan base that supports the company. We have worked on a wide range of issues over the years, everything from the focus on on climate change and climate justice to international trade policy. We were one of the first companies to promote the idea of LGBT rights and marriage equality. Uh, we've worked on issues around budget priorities. So, uh, we ran after the the end of the Cold War, a campaign to reduce military spending and invest in kids, education and healthcare. We don't pretend to be experts on all these issues. We want to bring the unique set of tools and channels and our fan base to bear on the strategies of our partners. And so that's a really critical critical piece of how we do what we do. We don't invent campaign strategies. We don't pretend to know what the best policy solutions are to go after some of these problems, but we work with a with a broad landscape of progressive partners to do that now. You mentioned earlier that you're the white company in a white state. Where do you see Ben and Jerry's needing to do more work here? I mean, I am sure that this is also a moment of self reflection for you as a company. How are you thinking about that? And how do you How are you hoping to change? The company's going forward. We have, I think, three primary parts of the business that are the kind of big material parts of our company, and we need to do more work in each one of them. So one is with our kind of corporate headquarter staff and leadership team. We, uh we are not very diverse. Same is true in our franchise community. So we have 300 shops around the U. S. Most of those shops are franchised, own and owned and operated. And while the franchise community is more diverse than our corporate headquarters again, more work to be done there, and then the third areas around our supplier and supply chain. So in terms of kind of where we're buying ingredients that we put in the ice cream. What I can tell you is that in some ways, a little ironically, Yeah, we had been in the process of kicking off a series of internal working groups focused on franchise community hiring, recruiting, retaining and supply chain that had been planned and in the works for months, recruiting a series of internal people to participate in these setting the group's up. I wish that this work had started earlier. On the other hand, it now has the attention and, um, the sort of juice underneath it to really move it forward. Given the recent events, I will say it's not enough. It's not enough for us just to reflect internally. We have to. We have to do this work externally as well. And so I think, you know, companies like ours need to be held to a high standard. We all do, and we also need to be engaging outside of our companies with policy makers and with our consumer base and others to advance this agenda. Otherwise, we could turn Ben and Jerry's off tomorrow and I'll go home, and none of this is soft You know, somebody asked me the other day, but you're an ice cream company. Like what permission do you have as an ice cream company to do this? And I think, you know, why isn't everyone else doing it? Why? Why? You know? Yes, An ice cream company can do it. And you know everyone else can as well. Why not an ice cream company?