Barilla’s homophobic statements result in reputational downslide

As a consequence of Barilla’s chairman, Guido Barilla, making homophobic statements during a live interview the concrete damage of his words become evident. He said he would “never do [a commercial] with a homosexual family” and if gays did not like this, they could buy somebody else’s pasta.. Since then, the company fell 21 ranks in the list of the World’s Most Reputable Companies, sponsored by Forbes. After undergoing an outcry about the discriminating faux pas in social media and a boycott petition with 85,000 signatures, the company had apologised and used US experts to facilitate contacts. But the perceptions of the consumer had already been spoiled and could not be fixed. The company ended up at 55th in the Forbes rating.

The survey measures companies’ consumer reputation in 15 countries around the world and covers the attitudes of the most important stakeholder for B2C-companies. Guido Barilla’s remarks sent the company’s reputation plummeting in the U.S., U.K., India, Australia and Brazil, while the effect was much lower in countries like China, Germany and Spain. Apparently many, but not all consumers react strongly to discrimination. If they only were more aware that it could be their own employer showing hostile attitudes …