Sadly, the company's longtime VP for communications died of a heart attack Friday morning, and the natural assumption is stress from the company's marriage equality controversy contributed to his death, though who knows?
It's unusual for a company to take sides in a divisive public issue, but, company COO Dan Cathy did so when he said in an interview that his company is "guilty as charged" in opposing same-sex marriage.
Soon, even the Muppets were involved, canceling a toy promotion with the company. Facebook is filled with arguments for and against the Cathy's stand.
At one point there was a side argument about whether the company created a fake teen girl Facebook account to defend itself.
Is it ever a good idea to have your company's brand associated with a serious pro-con controversy? Can you imagine McDonald's taking sides in the marriage equality issue? Or gun control or abortion?I can't remember a single U.S. corporation taking a public stand for or against the War in Vietnam (though Walter Cronkite's editorial on CBS could be an exception), and most large firms avoided taking public stands during the Civil Rights Movement. Local companies like Ollie's BBQ in Birmingham became extreme exceptions. Ollie's, of course, is no more.
Woolworth's and other stores with lunch-counters claimed refusing service to black customers was following local "tradition".
Hard to imagine a company using that dodge today.
And Woolworth's is gone too.
[PLUS: USA Today published a story on Friday night that included a number of big name business owners who took a stand for same-sex marriage in light of the Chick-fil-a controversy.]
[AND: The TDAW newspaper group has another of the weekly columns out, answering some reader questions. One asks: this three-day-a-week printed schedule means the eventual complete end for printed papers, right? The answer "I think that's a long way off...".]
[The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of www.timlennox.com]
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