They poured the liquid—blueberry flavored, orange flavored, and the original unflavored version—by tweeting #DumpRussianVodka, and gay bars across the country dispensed with Absolut and soda instead.
This was in 2013, after Vladimir Putin introduced harsh new measures against LGBTQ Russians.
And now that Russian aggression in Ukraine is taking a horrific toll, turning millions into refugees, the boycotts are back: American consumers are expressing outrage by refusing products they assume are made by Russians in Russia who are somehow connected to Mr. – Mr. Putin.
The problem with this logic is that Americans hardly ever consume truly Russian products. This applies to both vodka and oil. Russian oil makes up 3 percent of what Americans consume daily.
This misperception has led to people penalizing businesses that are actually Russian in name only. Some states that have recently banned Russian liquor have found that they are establishing policies that affect only two brands with a small presence in the domestic market – Russian Standard and Ustyanochka. On Friday, President Biden announced a ban on imports of all alcoholic beverages from Russia. But less than 1 percent of the vodka consumed here comes from Russia, the drinks trade group says.
Most commonly, but incorrectly, associated with Russia, Stolichnaya vodka has again fallen victim to online calls for a boycott. It has been manufactured in Latvia since 2002 and its parent company Stoli Group is headquartered in Luxembourg. Last week, the company officially renamed its signature spirit to Stoli after bar owners from Vermont from Michigan to Iowa said they would no longer serve it and shared a video of them throwing the bottles out of it down the drain.
In New York, the famous red banquets at the Russian Tea Room are less crowded these days. But the restaurant’s Russian heritage is sleight of hand. It was opened in 1927 by a Polish immigrant who named it the Russian Tea Room Albertina Rush, after a ballerina who was a Viennese although many considered her Russian at the time.
In Chicago, a Russian-style banya called “Red Square” has reported strange phone calls from people trying to find out if she took sides in the war. But the co-owner of Red Square is a man who was born in Ukraine and said that he still has a family in the country.
In Washington, at the Russian House restaurant near Dupont Circle, the windows were broken and the door was smashed. Its co-owner told local media that the business, closed after the pandemic, had nothing to do with Russia. According to his website, which advertises caviar pastes as a kind of indulgence that many Americans associate with Russian decadence, one owner fought in the Gulf War and the other was born in Lithuania.
The misplaced anger of the backlash against Russia has been a cautionary tale for those who study consumer habits, highlighting that boycotts are particularly ineffective and often counterproductive as a tool of protest in the age of social media. A staple of American political resistance since the Boston Tea Party, boycotts have played a vital role in shaping public opinion about demonstrations in support of social progress. Civil rights bus boycotts in the South and grape boycotts in the 1960s and 70s to protest conditions for farm workers contributed to significant change.
But today this is no longer the case, despite the exponential growth in the number of boycotts against large corporations. One study by a pair of academics, Maurice Schweitzer of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and Joseph Gaspar of the University of Quinnipiac, found that boycott calls against Fortune 500 companies have almost tripled since 2010. published, also found that the most common trigger was politics.
Calls for a boycott can be effective in creating bad publicity that tarnishes, at least temporarily, a company’s brand image. Sometimes they push companies to change, as happened with the backlash at SeaWorld over the treatment of killer whales. In 2016, the company announced that it was ending its breeding program, meaning that the generation of killer whales now in its theme parks would be the last.
But more often than not, consumer boycotts don’t have a significant impact on the profits of the target company because they’re either too hard to stick to, as people found when they tried to avoid BP gas after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, or because they evoke a strong response from consumers. who want to support the company precisely because it is under attack.
After Chick-fil-A’s chief executive declared his opposition to same-sex marriage in 2012, mayors of liberal cities like San Francisco and Boston said the Southern fried chicken diner should look elsewhere for new restaurants. Conservatives such as Mike Huckabee, a former Baptist preacher and two-time presidential candidate, have rallied their followers to support the network. Its nationwide expansion has continued at a rapid pace, with Chick-fil-A restaurants now open from Brooklyn to Seattle.
“It’s either too tasty or too convenient,” Mr. Schweitzer of the Wharton School said of cutting out certain foods. Another factor, he added, is the sheer amount of news that people find politically motivated. “Weekly or monthly there is something to resent,” he said. “And at the moment, the emotions seem raw and strong, but we are not able to appreciate how fleeting they are.”
One of the reasons why boycott calls continue to grow despite their ineffectiveness is that many people seem to believe they are holding their own when in fact they are not.
The draft of a new study by scientists from Northwestern University, the University of Toronto and Harvard Business School examines the impact of several recent politically motivated calls to action, including the campaign to boycott or “buy” Starbucks after it was announced in 2017. that he would hire 10,000 refugees. The move comes in response to former President Donald Trump’s order to stop migration from seven predominantly Muslim countries.
Russian-Ukrainian War and the World Economy
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Lack of basic metals. The price of palladium, used in car exhaust systems and mobile phones, is skyrocketing amid fears that Russia, the world’s largest exporter of the metal, could be cut off from global markets. Nickel prices, another key Russian export, are also on the rise.
financial turmoil. Global banks are bracing for the fallout from sanctions designed to restrict Russia’s access to foreign capital and limit its ability to process payments in dollars, euros and other currencies critical to trade. Banks are also ready for retaliatory cyberattacks from Russia.
The researchers surveyed more than 1,000 consumers, collected data on their actual spending at Starbucks over several months, and asked if their shopping behavior had changed because of the refugee announcement. They found that those who reported that they had changed their habits—either in support of Starbucks by buying more or against it by boycotting—were not actually doing anything differently.
Kathy DeSelles, professor of organizational behavior at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management and one of the study’s authors, said the results showed that people of all political backgrounds believe what they want to be true about their own behavior.
Researchers were surprised that such an emotionally charged and highly publicized issue had no measurable impact on spending.
“We thought that if we could find an impact on people’s behavior, it would happen now,” Ms. DeSelles added.
As this study and current anti-Stolesk sentiment show, anger directed at consumer boycotts is often devoid of coherent logic. While some states such as Pennsylvania and Oregon did not include Stoli in their Russian liquor ban, New Hampshire did. A spokesman for the state liquor commission confirmed that since Governor Chris Sununu’s order applies not only to Russian-made products, but also to “Russian-branded” products, Stoli will not be sold on the shelves of state-owned stores.
Damian McKinney, chief executive of the Stoli Group, said in an interview that misconceptions about the brand nearly resulted in major business losses. He recalled a recent conversation with the head of a major retailer in the UK, who told him that Stoli was about to be taken off the shelves.
“I said: “Do you know that we are Latvians?” And there was a pause,” Mr. McKinney said, declining to name a retailer. As he spoke, the background of his Zoom screen was framed in the blue and yellow colors of the Ukrainian flag along with the hashtag #StandWithUkraine. “I need people to understand that we are on the side of the good guys. And we are talking about an evil person and a regime, and not about the Russian people, ”he added, noting that not only Ukrainians, but also Russians work at Stoli.
Like many companies, Stoli does not have a unique identity that can be simply outlined. The recipe is Russian, like the name. “Capital” is roughly translated as “metropolitan”. Company founder Yuri Shefler fled Russia after a dispute with the government over control of the Stoli trademark. Today he lives in Switzerland. For years, Russia fought Stoli in court over the rights to claim ownership of the name. The company manufactures bottle caps and some bottles in Ukraine and recently evacuated five Ukrainian employees from the country to Cyprus and Luxembourg, according to Mr. McKinney.
The Russian tea house, where only a few tables were occupied during Friday’s pre-theater rush, has an equally complex pedigree, despite its name. Its current owner is a New York real estate developer. But it began in 1927 as a popular haunt for Russians who emigrated to America and received citizenship. A 1977 New York Times story commemorating the restaurant’s 50th anniversary noted that from the start, the restaurant was patronized by exiles who called themselves “White Russians” to distinguish themselves from Lenin’s “Red” Bolsheviks.
And almost a century later, making these distinctions with the Moscow regime is more important than ever. On the restaurant’s website, diners are greeted with a pop-up banner with a statement about the war in Ukraine, celebrating its history as an establishment “deeply rooted in opposition to the communist dictatorship.” He adds: “We stand against Putin and together with the people of Ukraine.”
Kristen Noyes contributed to the study.