The 5 Trillion-Dollar Woman: Equality and the Power of Consumer Revolution

photo credit: International Railway Summit [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Flickr (cropped)

For the most part, the business world operates like one big MANEL. A group of older white men on the podium drone to a voiceless audience of women and underrepresented people. Then they pocket big speaker fees.

It’s not news that the majority of US companies function the same way. White men lead them, take the largest salaries, build workplaces that are unwelcoming to women and people of color, don’t give back to those communities, and put little effort into changing the status quo. According to Gender Fair’s research, only about 10% of consumer companies support women and equality in a meaningful, measurable way. The rest do poorly; that is to say, they lack parity of leadership, paid parental leave, work life policies, accurate advertising portrayals, diversity reporting, and philanthropy for women and girls.

Those businesses sell us what we need in life: cars, gas, computers, coffee, food, clothing, and even shoes! Women control 70-80% of consumer spending, yet we keep on giving companies that are decidedly NOT pro-woman our hard-earned money. We make few demands on thousands of businesses that depend on womens’ dollars — our $5 trillion. There’s a saying that the customer is king, but clearly she is not a queen, or maybe the queen just forgot she holds a kick-ass sceptre! The other saying, “money talks”, doesn’t explain that women’s money whispers and tries not to call attention to itself.

So just like in Network, let’s open the window and shout, “I'M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!” Let’s stop buying from companies that are not equitable and switch to brands that are — as well as spending with women and Black-owned businesses. For years, Gender Fair has rated top consumer brands, and very few meet the mark. If we want more equality for women (and non-white men) in the workforce, we can’t just wait around — we must pressure companies and organizations to be more fair. There’s nothing in it for them otherwise. Scholars and financial wizards have written about the theoretical business case for diversity and gender equality over and over. For years and years. Even the promise of earning more or creating bigger profits does not budge the macho status quo. However, women exerting our financial power is a palpable business case for change that will show up on the bottom line.

photo credit: Sharon McCutcheon, via Unsplash

Indeed, there are past examples of women making an impact in the marketplace. In 2013, A petition signed by 360,000 people convinced Kraft to remove dyes from its mac n’ cheese. The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics persuaded Johnson & Johnson to redo the baby shampoo recipe. One of the most successful is the #NotBuyingIt Campaign. For years, scholars and feminists complained about objectifying ads, then beginning in 2013, the Representation Project reached millions of people over several years. Armed with an 11 word hashtag, battalions of culture watchers tweeted about Pink toy aisles and objectified female bodies until they shamed companies to act. It helped transform the advertising of many companies, most notably GoDaddy and its formerly sexist Superbowl ads. Within a few years, fewer ads showed bikini-clad women shilling products that weren’t related to the beach. If you don’t buy it, you will get companies’ attention. Progressive moms in the 70s denied their kids iceberg lettuce or grapes to support farmworkers. Go back even further, and sugar boycotts preceded the abolitionist movement. Even children realized that those white crystals that sweetened their tea came at the cost of great suffering and did without, or maybe used maple syrup or honey instead.

The last digital decade of online petitions and social media call-outs has made many companies realize women pay the bills. Some have actually tried to improve internally, but others stop at wooing women customers. Brands hire big male-run ad agencies to produce rah-rah commercials with women driving race cars, leading meetings, or men doing laundry. Other businesses drop serious coin to sponsor “empowerment” events or virtual extravaganzas (often run by male-owned or -led companies) where women employees are “celebrated” and yammered at by celebrities and the same recycled A-list of high-profile execs who survived the corporate obstacle course. Some companies pay to be featured on questionable “best of” lists with opaque parameters and feeble journalistic oversight. Those ads may give the feels, the speakers at those events may blow bubbles of “girl power”, and those lists may impress people, but, in many cases, that female-friendly future is performative. Companies holding Women’s History Month parties may have more Mad Men in their DNA. Look behind the curtain, and the same manels may be leading meetings. Pull that curtain waaay back, and there may be few women leaders and no equal pay studies, or they may be forced to sign away their right to sue for cases of harassment, among other offenses.

Don’t be taken in by these feminist facades and charades. If you want a more equal world, learn if a company shares your feminist values before giving up your cash. It will make a difference. The more of us who do it, the more brands will notice. Telling brands on social media will amplify the effect. A Lysistrata-style boycott could fix the American workplace — for all people. Since 2009, the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index has changed LGBTQ policies in 767 companies, improving the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. Women can do the same: be part of a consumer revolution. There’s no need to march, it doesn’t cost anything, it’s easy activism.

Just #BuyTheChange you want to see.

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Amy-Willard Cross is a former magazine editor, writer, and author who founded Gender Fair and tries to live her principles of financial feminism.

Gender Fair publishes its ratings of thousands of brands on our free app (iOS and Android), which scans logos, (provides search functions,) and will recommend Gender Fair brands.