General Motors Refutes Charge Of Ignoring Black-Owned Media For Advertising

General Motors Company GM is pushing back against accusations leveled by a group of high-profile Black media professionals that the company practices racial discrimination in its media purchasing strategies.

What Happened: In a full-page advertisement that appeared in yesterday’s Detroit Free Press, the media professionals claimed that GM CEO Mary Barra has repeatedly refused to honor their requests for a face-to-face meeting to discuss the automobile manufacturer’s advertising practices.

The advertisement, which took the form of an open letter, claimed GM spends less than 0.5% of its advertising in Black-owned media, even though “African Americans make up approximately 14% of the population in America and we spend billions buying your vehicles.”

The open letter added that the most recent request for a meeting with Barra came two weeks ago, with GM Chief Marketing Officer Deborah Wahl responding on Barra’s behalf and offering to make herself available for a discussion.

“You stand on stage, after the death of George Floyd, saying, ‘Black Lives Matter,’ when you have refused to acknowledge us,” the ad reads. “The very definition of systemic racism is when you are ignored, excluded and you don’t have true economic inclusion.”

The signatories of the open letter and ad included Byron Allen, a comedian and chairman-CEO of Allen Media Group; rapper/actor Ice Cube of BIG3, Cubevision and CWBA; Earl “Butch” Graves Jr., president and CEO of Black Enterprise; and Junior Bridgeman, former basketball star and owner of Ebony Media.

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What Happened Next: GM issued a statement disputing the open letter and noted it is working in a partnerships with National Newspaper Publishers Association, a collective of Black newspaper publishers, and with the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters and the Alliance for Inclusive and Multicultural Marketing.

“General Motors aspires to be the most inclusive company in the world, and that includes how we allocate media spend,” the company said in its statement. “We have increased our planned spending with both diverse-owned and diverse-dedicated media across our family of brands.”

The company added that it “will continue to have an open dialogue with Mr. Allen.”

At last check, GM was trading at $56.54, up 0.027% as of Monday afternoon.

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(Photo courtesy Michigan Municipal League)