Guido Barilla

Guido Barilla

Like many, I was shocked to hear that Barilla CEO Guido Barilla had told an Italian radio host that the family company “would never do [a commercial] with a homosexual couple, not for lack of respect, but because we don’t agree with them.”

Barilla, based in Parma, Italy, is the world’s largest manufacturer of pasta. The CEO’s September 2013 comments caused an immediate uproar (and I tore up my carefully hoarded coupons). Barilla laid down a challenge: “If [gays] don’t like it, they can go eat another brand.”

Other families went further than eliminating coupons.

As the Washington Post reports, the company soon had to eat its own words:

Harvard University dumped Barilla from its cafeterias, gay rights groups promoted names of other brands of pasta, and Barilla’s competitors seized on the opportunity to present themselves as more forward-thinking, with Bertolli Germany posting a comment on its Facebook page promoting ‘pasta and love for all!’

In a little over a year, however, Barilla has made a dramatic change. Not only has Barilla himself apologized multiple times; the company has expanded health benefits for transgender workers and their families, contributed money to gay rights causes, and featured a lesbian couple on a promotional Web site. On November 19, the Human Rights Campaign‘s Corporate Equality Index gave Barilla a perfect score for gay-friendliness. The report itself is a fascinating example of how tolerance can be measured and depicted graphically.

As the Post’s Sandhya Somashekhar notes, the company’s turnaround highlights how businesses, which typically shy away from controversy, “are increasingly being forced to take sides in the cultural battle over gay rights and same-sex marriage — and how decisively pro-gay forces have gained the upper hand.” While the boycott itself barely touched the company’s revenues, the implications for the brand and long term effects were what turned the company around.

As well as, the piece notes, Barilla’s own apparent change of heart. What may be less examined — but ultimately powerful — is the role a coordinated outcry can play in calling people on their prejudice and forcing them to take the necessary steps to better educate themselves. For rights campaigners, the attraction of a boycott is not only the economic effect, but the opportunity the boycott presents to educate the public — and behind-the-times CEOs.

 

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