Brown-Forman has scrapped its diversity and inclusion policies and ended its participation in an LGBTQ corporate equality index.
An email sent out by Brown-Forman’s executive leadership team was posted on X by US conservative activist Robby Starbuck, in which the group said it was making changes to its policies to “account for the ever-changing landscape”.
The group said it would be “ensuring” executive incentives and employee goals are tied to business performance and that it would be removing its “quantitative workforce and supplier diversity ambitions”.
The web pages on Brown-Forman’s site that listed its diversity and inclusion policies have been removed.
While Brown-Forman is issuing no official statement, it confirmed the existence of the email.
In the email, Brown-Forman also said it would be ending its participation in the LGBTQ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign’s corporate equality index. The index is a report that rates businesses on their treatment of LGBTQ staff.
The Human Rights Campaign has called out Brown-Forman, arguing the company had “bowed to a fringe-right activist” with no business experience.
“Robby Starbuck is so radical the Tennessee Republican party kicked him off the ballot. Companies should not be cowering to a random guy with zero business experience who is a political bully and election denier. These shortsighted decisions also have long term consequences,” Eric Bloem, VP of programmes and corporate advocacy at the Human Rights Campaign, said.
“With nearly 30% of Gen Z identifying as LGBTQ+ and the community wielding $1.4 trillion in spending power, retreating from these principles undermines both consumer trust and employee success.”
The group’s diversity and inclusion strategy was first introduced in 2019.
In the leaked email, Brown-Forman wrote: “Since then, the world has evolved, our business has changed, and the legal and external landscape has shifted dramatically, particularly within the United States. With these new dynamics at play, we must adjust our work to ensure it continues to drive business results while appropriately recognising the current environment in which we find ourselves.”
Last year, Anheuser-Busch InBev faced a consumer backlash after a social media promotional tie-up with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney, who quickly became a target of transphobic abuse from conservative-leaning figures in the US, leading to calls for a boycott of the Bud Light brand.
Despite numerous attempts by AB InBev to quell the controversy, Bud Light’s sales slipped dramatically in the US, with the beer losing its crown as the country’s best-selling beer to Constellation Brands’ Modelo Especial.
In February, AB InBev CEO Michel Doukeris told analysts during a full-year earnings call that the group was still feeling the effects of the backlash and that it would continue to see growth slowly come back quarter-by-quarter.
