Branding
You’ve heard a lot in the news about backlash against certain brands and products for political reasons…boycotting stores because they stopped carrying My Pillow, swearing off Bud Light because of the transgender controversy, avoiding Target because of advertising and alleged grooming.
A group called Engagement Labs released a report last month that said, based on consumer conversation data for nearly 500 brands, more than a fifth of the talk was polarized between Republicans and Democrats. In other words, of the 500 brands discussed with consumers, 23 percent were predictable customers based on political views.
For example, DiGiorno pizza, Vanguard investments, and Moderna pharmaceuticals are seen much more positively among Democrats than Republicans. Conversely, Olive Garden, Holiday Inn and Fox News have ratings that are far more positive among Republicans than Democrats.
The folks doing the survey concede that while some of this is easy to figure out—Moderna is not popular among Republicans, Fox News not popular among Democrats—there are no good reasons why Olive Garden, Red Lobster, Holiday Inn, Jif Peanut Butter and Swiffer would be more positively discussed among Republicans than Democrats…and why Republicans are sour on DiGiorno and Vanguard. They speculate that Fox News hosts talk positively about Olive Garden, so that might explain the drop among Democrats…and Vanguard has an association with ESG, so that would lower them in esteem of Republicans…but they admit that’s their speculation.
Democrats also have more affinity, it appears, for Silk soymilk, TracFone, Pfizer and Venmo…while Republicans are more into Hobby Lobby, Ajax…and the Chicago Cubs.
Those measures are seen by the largest spread between positive comments of those affiliating with each party. There are other businesses where the difference between Republican and Democrat viewpoint is not great—chief among them the Disney brand, which is still viewed positively by 67 percent of Democrats and 59 percent of Republicans.
Again, not always easy to explain some of this stuff.
