A Sticky Wickesette

Fraser Longden is the Chief Operating Officer of Wickes, a hardware/garden store chain in the UK. Last year they sponsored a float in the Brighton Pride parade that had the slogan "No LGB without the T." Underneath that the poster added "We stand with our trans siblings now and forever." The float also had a poster that said "Ban Conversion Therapy for ALL." It should not come as a surprise that did not go over very well with some Wickes customers.

However, Wickes was not finished. Pink News, an online newspaper with a target audience easily guessed by its name, held an online "trans summit" this week. During that summit Longden said "I don't think I'm ever going to change some of the bigots minds, I'm never going to win that argument with them, so we were doing (the Pride float) to show support to the community." He added "(bigots) are not welcome in our stores."

Wickes float in Brighton Photo: IBC.UK

The London Stock exchange lists Wickes' year-to-date return as -17.25%. The one-year return is -34.20.

 

Of course, Wickes is not the first corporation to give the middle finger to its customer base. In the US it has been suggested that some of these moves are done because large investment companies such as Blackrock require such "Social Justice" positions in order to receive funding. On one hand that seems possible, but these companies taking the loans do need to pay them back. It seems that would be hard to do if a company alienates more than half of its customer base.

 

There must be something else going on. It is no secret that many "Social Justice Activists" are anti-capitalistic. Is it possible that these company-destroying moves are calculated to weaken the capitalist system?  Perhaps their thinking is that if they sink these companies they sink the Western economies. Yes that seems like a conspiracy theory, but it sure makes more sense than companies doing it because the don't like a majority of their customers.

 

In 1987, the US stock market lost more than 20% in one day. I remember Paul Harvey rejecting the doom and gloom, saying it was small businesses that kept the economy rolling -- and they were not affected that much  by the stock market.

 

But maybe COVID was designed to take care of them.