Luxottica joining a campaign against Fox
As the retail parent of lensCrafter and Pearle Vision, Luxottica Retail has recently joined a boycott against the Glenn Beck program belonging to Fox News Channel. The campaign launched by ColorChange.org is to some extent a combination of political and commercial issues.
All controversies originate from the attack against the US president Barack Obama by a Fox News Channel host several weeks ago. The host charged Obama with a racist that has a deep-seated hatred for white people. This subjective attack caused unpleasant reaction from the public, resulting in the current resistance to Beck.
Before the entry of Luxottica, along with other five companies including Aegon, Ashley Furniture, Humana, United States Postal Service and Wyeth Consumer Healthcare, there are already 56 companies who have been in the campaign. Those companies include Airware Inc., Allergan (maker of Restasis), Ally Bank (a unit of GMAC Financial Services), Ancestry.com, Applebee’s, AT&T, Bank of America, Best Buy, Blaine Labs Inc., Broadview Security, Campbell Soup Company, ConAgra, Clorox, CVS, DirecTv, Ditech, The Elations Company etc.
The only action advocated by ColorChange.org is to cut off or entirely pull back advertisements on Beck. Many firms have made formal contact with FOX through email. The Postal Service’s Advertising Department stopped its ads on Beck immediately when the issue occurred. Through email, Aegon and Ashley Furniture have also required Beck to remove its ads on the program. Other companies including Humana and Luxottica simply take a similar reaction through a phone conversation. Luxottica Retail takes a rapid action of pulling ads and claims that it has no plans to air more ads on Beck.
Besides persuading other companies, ColorOfChange.org has still launched a signed petition among its members, which has attracted as many as 180,000 people. The petition aims at urging corporation to reduce advertisements on Beck.