#BLM: Are brands cashing in?
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 19 June 2020
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Companies are pledging support and money to the Black Lives Matter movement, and an end to systemic racism. Do they mean it?
Ed Butler asks Pepper Miller, a market researcher who has campaigned for over 20 years for companies to realise the value of African-American consumers.
One business that already has a long history of supporting black equality and other social justice movements is the ice cream brand Ben & Jerry's. But the company is based in Vermont, the second whitest state in America. Ed asks activism manager Chris Miller whether the firm's purported values are also reflected in their own personnel decisions.
It's a pertinent question, according to Scott Galloway, professor of marketing at the NYU Stern School of Business. With the shift in demographics and purchasing power towards young educated liberal urban workers, and the increased scrutiny of company behaviour in the Google era, he says American businesses see commercial opportunity in taking a much more overt position on US politics than we have seen in the past.
(Picture: Ben & Jerry's Justice Remixed ice cream brand ice cream tub; Credit: Ben & Jerry's)
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hi there, I'm Ed Butler. |
| 0:02.8 | Welcome to Business Daily from the BBC. |
| 0:05.4 | Coming up, what should companies do to show they really support racial justice? |
| 0:11.0 | Some have outlined, like, we're going to hire more black people, and we're going to give some money to some black charitable organizations. |
| 0:21.8 | Eh, that says not enough. |
| 0:24.2 | It's different now. |
| 0:25.6 | The Black Lives Matter protests have changed the game, they say, |
| 0:29.2 | forcing corporate America to sole search. |
| 0:32.0 | Or have they just shone a light on a new path to profit? |
| 0:35.5 | The consumer brands are responding to the fact that the largest gross margin dollars |
| 0:40.3 | are either controlled by or influenced by a younger, more multiracial, more progressive |
| 0:46.4 | viewpoint. |
| 0:47.7 | That's all to come in Business Daily from the BBC. |
| 0:52.8 | My name is Pepper Miller. |
| 0:54.9 | I am a market researcher. |
| 0:57.6 | I'm an author, and I help large corporations understand the value of black Americans as a people and as a market segment so that they can have loyal customers and a positive bottom line. |
| 1:13.4 | That's a lot. |
| 1:14.3 | It's a lot. It is a lot. |
| 1:17.6 | And we could do that again. |
| 1:19.6 | No need, I'm sure. |
| 1:21.0 | Pepper Miller's long career speaking to brands about how to speak to black people |
| 1:25.5 | hasn't always been easy. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.