As we've been talking about, Ford caved to the demands of the American Family Association, for about a week, when threatened with a boycott. Gay rights groups went crazy and demanded that Ford reverse its decision - they did.

Turns out that it was a lot more than just pressure from GLBT groups. Ford shareholders played a large part in the decision to not alienate the gay and lesbian community.

From 365gay.com:
But the decision may not have been the result of pressure from gay groups, but rather from at least two large institutional shareholders who supports LGBT issues.

One of them was the New York State Local Retirement System - the biggest state pension plan in the country.

Its administrator, New York State Comptroller Alan Hevesi confirmed Friday that he contacted Ford Chair William Clay Ford Jr. to voice his displeasure that the company had appeared to cave-in to demands from the AFA.

In a letter to Ford, Hevesi said he wanted the know the reasons behind the decision.

"I am interested to know what cost/benefit analysis you performed in order to reach the conclusion that ending advertising to that particular customer base would be a positive strategic move for the company," Hevesi wrote in his letter to the chair.

Hevesi not only pointed out the importance of diversity, but the importance of being seen as unbiased. He also noted that the LGBT market is worth an estimated $610 billion annually.

Hevesi is the sole trustee of the retirement fund which controls about 9.4 million shares of Ford stock valued about $107 million.

Ford, which this year teetered on economic disaster was concerned that its position could be weakened by shareholder dissent sources within the company said.

The company officially maintains the intervention of Hevesi and other shareholder groups played no part in the final decision to maintain its LGBT ads and made no mention of the groups in its statement to gay rights groups.

Posted by Bryan Harding

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 17, 2005 at 10:12 AM. Want to discuss? Leave a comment below.