Corporate sponsors are backing away from LGBTQ+ Pride organizations
Revelers attend the annual LGBTQ+ Capital Pride parade in Washington D.C., U.S., June 8, 2024.
Leah Millis | Reuters
Companies that were once loud and proud in supporting LGBTQ+ community celebrations are pulling back.
LGBTQ+ Pride festivals across the country have faced significant sponsorship challenges this year, with some losing corporate partners that collectively provided six-figure donations. As a result, organizations say they’ve had to modify their programming, pivot to other funding sources and reconsider their dependencies on corporate dollars.
Many companies have cited economic concerns as their impetus to delay or exit partnerships with Pride groups. But LGBTQ+ group leaders also noted an increasingly hostile climate for diversity, equity and inclusion efforts that has prompted some businesses to rethink their support. In turn, Pride organizations are seeking clarity on how much their values still align with those of their corporate contributors.
“For this many companies to be dropping off, I think, points to that we’re in a different political environment than we have been maybe in a long, long time,” San Francisco Pride executive director Suzanne Ford told CNBC.
Financial challenges
Many LGBTQ+ groups consider certain corporations to be longtime partners, but organizers said they often ink one-year deals that are negotiated in the months before the annual Pride celebrations. That leaves them vulnerable if once-reliable companies decide to withhold their dollars, and several organizations said they are facing sponsorship deficits that weigh on budgets and plans for festivals in the summer.
Among the largest shortfalls, Seattle Pride and New York City Pride say they have to make up for $350,000 deficits, and San Francisco Pride and Minnesota’s Twin Cities Pride say they are each facing a $200,000 cut.
Some festivals have named which previous sponsors aren’t returning, while others said they are keeping that information private to avoid burning bridges.
San Francisco Pride’s Ford said Anheuser-Busch, Comcast, Diageo and Nissan have told the organization that they are not sponsoring the festival this year. All were previously longtime partners, Ford said.
The companies gave a variety of reasons for the change.
A Comcast representative said the company is participating in other Pride events in San Francisco and is supporting Pride parades in California in Oakland, Sacramento and Silicon Valley. A Diageo representative said the company will appear at Pride events across the country through its Smirnoff brand this year. A Nissan spokesperson said in a statement that the automaker will not sponsor any Pride festivals this year as it reviews all marketing and sales spending. Anheuser-Busch didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Washington, D.C.-based Capital Pride Alliance, which is organizing the biannual, global WorldPride celebration this year, said Comcast and Deloitte had regularly supported the group’s Pride festival but declined to do so…
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