Navigating the Rainbow: How Brands Approach LGBTQI+ Visibility and Representation

The city of Munich buckled on this sunny early summer day, but the people of Munich stood their ground and literally showed the flag. It is June 23, 2021. The Bavarian state capital wanted to let the Allianz Arena shine in rainbow colors for the decisive group match of the German men’s national soccer team at the European Championship against Hungary in order to take a stand against a controversial homosexual law in Hungary. But 48 hours before kick-off, the associations UEFA and the EM organizing committee had forbidden the action.

Many Munich institutions, companies and people expressed what they thought of this (non-)attitude on the part of football officials on the day of the match: the city was lit up in red-orange-yellow-green-blue-purple in many places: theatres, churches, hotels and retailers hoisted the colorful flag of the LGBTQI+ community, even the Munich transport company had decorated its buses with little flags. In the newspaper boxes on the side of the road that are typical of Munich, the front pages clearly show the rainbow flag. A classic own goal for the football officials.

Rainbow flag as a symbol of the queer community

The rainbow flag is polarizing, although it is intended to be a positive symbol of the queer community for tolerance and diversity. So it was designed in San Francisco in 1978. Every year in June, the community celebrates its emancipation to commemorate the Stonewall riots in New York’s Christopher Street, which broke out on June 28, 1969 as a result of massive police violence against homosexuals and are considered the “birthday of gay pride” (Federal Agency for Political Education). . “That’s why we raise the flag to continue the fight for equality and to show the world our pride,” says the Schwulissimo portal.

In the meantime, especially in June, the so-called Pride Month, the flag also appears on numerous websites, social media accounts and brand logos of companies, which ostensibly express their solidarity with the LGBTQI+ community and also their own brand image with attributes such as tolerance, Equality and diversity want to charge. This can work – but it doesn’t have to, as numerous examples show.

“Companies use this to signal openness and the ability to adapt to current social issues,” says Jens Böcker. The marketing professor at the Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences sees a key success factor for companies in “interpreting and taking up changes”. This would also include social discussions, even if they were not directly related to the product portfolio: “By using the rainbow flag, companies are sending a signal – to their customers, employees and business partners,” says the marketing expert.

Kulturkampf over LGBTQI+ rights

The rainbow discussion is highly emotionally charged, US media even speak of a culture war over LGBTQI+ rights. Marketing professor Böcker warns that companies should therefore ensure that they remain authentic and not simply jump on a “moving train” in order to use the current discussion for more attention. Rainbow washing, where the deeper meaning of the rainbow flag is washed away, is quickly identified and then has the opposite effect and damages the image. Nor can it be ruled out that there may be counter-reactions, as recently happened to the US brewery Anheuser-Busch, which had a trans woman advertise its beer and was heavily criticized by the conservative camp.

He cites Burger King in Austria as another negative example: For the “Pride Whopper”, which was intended to send a signal for same-sex love simply by using two identical halves of a bun (twice on the top or bottom), but which the community considered “embarrassing”. and was criticized as “senseless”, even the responsible advertising agency Jung von Matt Donau apologized afterwards.

BMW faced accusations of double standards in 2021 after the group colored its brand logo in rainbow colors, but only in western and southern European markets, not in the Middle East, Russia or Turkey. The carmaker countered an initial wave of criticism on the grounds that it “takes country-specific cultural aspects into account”. Retaliation on the internet: If ‘country-specific’ queer people were oppressed, BMW would refrain from hoisting the flag. The car manufacturer referred to the BR on its queer network with more than 500 members worldwide.

A year ago, Lufthansa maneuvered itself into a storm of protests by having an Airbus A320neo with a special paint job called “Lovehansa” take to the air. In doing so, the company wanted to “make this important part of the corporate culture prominently visible to the outside world”. The campaign started, of course, just in time for Pride Month, but it was planned to run for six months.

Fashion manufacturers regularly launch entire Pride collections in the colors of the rainbow or with other symbols of the queer community in June and are thus accused of wanting to make a profit from the rainbow. US corporations such as Walmart, AT&T, McDonald’s or Amazon have presented themselves as allies of the queer community, but at the same time financed homophobic or transphobic politicians in election campaigns.

Rainbow flag flies in parking lots of Rewe supermarkets

But how do brands manage to present themselves in a tolerant and diverse manner without immediately raising doubts about the credibility of their messages? For Böcker, this requires a serious dialogue with the queer community and long-term measures: “Trust must be developed step by step over a long period of time, and the basis for this is above all attentive listening. Do not develop something outside the community, but together and in a coordinated manner.” The companies would have to examine individually which path is most suitable – there is no standard answer.

There is no shortage of role models: The Swedish company Happy Socks, for example, donates part of its marketing budget and part of the proceeds from the year-round Pride collection to the NGO InterPride. The jeans brand Levi’s and the fashion chain H&M also support organizations that fight for the rights of the community with the proceeds from Pride collections.

At the supermarket chain Rewe, rainbow flags fly in front of many markets, clearly visible from afar and all year round. According to its own statements, the company wants to “express its attitude” but also “set a diverse example of a diverse employee structure (…) and a non-discriminatory workplace”. Among other things, Rewe underpins these messages with a self-commitment to diversity (“Charter of Diversity”), which the retail company gave itself five years ago. After the scandal surrounding the “One Love” armband, Rewe ended a cooperation with the DFB at the end of 2022, which should not only have been well received by its own workforce.

LGBTQI+ networks at Bosch, SAP, Beiersdorf & Co.

The company’s own LGBTQI+ network has a good 300 members and various local groups. Such networks also exist in other companies, especially in the large employers. Bosch started doing this back in 2012, Be You @Beiersdorf, be.queer (Bertelsmann), Proud@Porsche and Pride@SAP are other prominent examples. The networks emerge from the workforce, provided the employers support it. “Companies are not islands, but an important part of society and play a key role in shaping it,” Rewe said on request. And what if some customers see things differently? “We can handle criticism of our attitude or our values ​​well,” it says succinctly.

The Schwulissimo portal is one of the “most significant Pride marketing campaigns” of the past year alongside those of the Oreo brand, Tinder and also Absolut Vodka, a brand that has consistently shown its connection to the LGBTQI+ community – “and It has been since 1981, when raising the rainbow flag was more of a risk than a marketing stunt for a company. With the current “Out & Open” campaign, the spirits manufacturer is providing financial support to the owners of LGBTQI+ bars. This is a very necessary step, because the number of queer-friendly bars has decreased significantly in recent years, according to the portal.

Online dating app Tinder is showing real commitment without putting itself too much in the spotlight: it’s working with the Human Rights Campaign to change a law in the US that still bans gay men from donating blood . In Germany, the Bundestag has just abolished a corresponding ban. Tinder wants to make a real contribution to more equality in this way.

Other brands don’t go that far, but the community doesn’t condemn that across the board: “Even if the double standards of many companies are unbearable, we shouldn’t just label Pride Month marketing as hypocrisy. Because despite everything, the campaigns promote the visibility of our community and stimulate the discourse on inclusive jobs and equality,” says Schwulissimo, for example. This discourse, brand engagement and connection to the queer community shouldn’t just be limited to one month a year.

Evidence of Rainbow Washing

• One company only advertises with the rainbow in June.
• One company has not launched any queer-friendly initiatives.
• A company does not donate to queer-friendly organizations.
• Queer employees are hardly included or are not hired.
• A company aggressively advertises with queer employees.
• A company advertises with the rainbow flag only in LGBTQI+ friendly countries.
• A company supports anti-queer organizations or individuals.

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