At this point, honestly, I’d take an M&S LGBT Sandwich. The lettuce, guac, bacon and tomato luncheon, branded by The Daily Mail the ‘woke sandwich’, might have felt tokenistic when it launched in 2019, but this Pride month amid the deafening silence of big brands hoping no one notices they’ve pulled all funding or support for LGBT causes, a little gay sandwich from a major high street retailer would feel like a real treat.
What’s happened? June is normally a rainbow-clad spectacular of try-hard corporate diversity shenanigans, earnest posturing and pinkwashing of everything from cupcakes to banking products. Social media is flooded with companies spotlighting their queer and trans employees, influencers waving their ally flags and at the very least a host of Pride-hued logo redesigns that appear on June 1st and revert to the original come July.
In terms of representation and authenticity, it’s never perfect, but it’s something and I’d rather be complaining about a brand’s vacuous attempt to jump on the LGBTQ bandwagon than wondering where the bandwagon has disappeared to. Because we’re in the middle of June now, the gayest calendar moment of the year (not counting Halloween) and… tumbleweed.
According to an article on Bloomberg ‘three quarters of more than 100 Pride organizers have seen a decline in corporate partnerships this year and a quarter of them have seen funding from sponsorships drop over 50%’. Bloomberg secured exclusive data from the UK Pride Organisers Network that shows smaller parades have been hit particularly hard, with several canceling events that were planned for Pride Month. They quote Christopher Joell-Deshields, chief executive officer of Pride in London as saying “Across the Pride movement, there is a very different feel this year… Some of our sponsors are global partners and we’re seeing the effect of those who are based in the US who have seen the roll back of DEI.”
Meanwhile, a friend of mine whispered: “Word on the street from the sales team at my office… lots of big brands in Europe shying away [from Pride] because they’re afraid Trump will sanction their business in US”.
Normally as an out and proud queer author, podcast host and thought leader I am fully booked with panel discussions, talks and sponsored content requests - this year I’ve had nothing. Not a single brand has reached out to me, a Professional Gay no less, for any kind of collab. You know that meme of the guy pushing his colleagues out of the way at the photocopier declaring ‘move! I’m gay!'? That’s how we LGBT people are supposed to feel at this time of year - special! Valued! Entitled! Celebrated! People are meant to be paying us handsomely to write letters to our younger selves, share our tales of trauma and homophobia and re-tell our coming out stories for clicks.
Worried it was just me, and I had become too old or irrelevant to be a face of corporate Pride this year, I reached out to my Instagram followers and was reassured, it was nothing personal. I had a deluge of messages from artists, activists and content creators of all ages and identities saying the same thing, as one woman put it, 'It’s a Pride ghost town'.
Lesbian writer and content creator @LauraSidestreet had this to say: 'I felt the change start last year and now it feels very apparent. I think big brands often fail to get it right and most people avoid pride-washing. On top of that budgets have changed along with what feels like more vocal right wing hate online, I wonder if brands don’t want to deal with that, don’t want to lose followers/sales etc so are opting to stay out of it.'
'Everyone I know in this line of work is experiencing the same thing,' Finn Love (@finnbarlove), a dancer and calisthenics coach commented. 'DEI budgets slashed across the board - big corporations aren’t doing all their usual Pride events which for years were reliable corporate rates (lots of money) for artists'. Finn puts it down to 'less budget generally and a culture of hostility towards queer initiatives… and TERFS.'
Ah yes - the media and government spin over the trans ‘debate’ has no doubt left many companies, without sensible LGBT people to advise them, in a muddle over if and how to include people who are not cis-gendered in their Pride endeavours.
A transphobic government and the amount of misinformation being spread online about the perceived ‘threat’ posed by trans women means companies are backing away from supporting LGBT causes for fear of upsetting gender critical people. Now is the time to stand up for trans people, include them and double down on efforts not back quietly away for fear of saying or doing the wrong thing. There is no LGB without the T.
In my new book Do Ask, Do Tell, which I’ve co-written with Stu Oakley, we explore the rise of transphobia in this country and how it has been fuelled by a toxic combination of media narratives, political cowardice and social media algorithms that favour outrage over empathy. In our efforts to address the lack of understanding even within our own queer community, we spoke to trans people on the front line of this so-called culture war who told us the same thing: the fear-mongering doesn’t reflect reality. What’s happening is a wilful erasure of nuance. Companies that once pledged to ‘listen and learn’ now seem to be covering their ears.
Some big British brands such as TESCO - which is giving 5 percent of all profits made on sales of its 2025 Pride range to the LGBT+ Switchboard and is a sponsor of London Pride this year - are willing to put their head above the parapet (note to self: time to switch that Ocado delivery). And so is my daughter’s primary school! Working with the teaching staff I’ve volunteered to host a Pride celebration for the children for the second year running. There’ll be assemblies, book readings and age appropriate learning talking about diverse families, and modelling acceptance and inclusion with the easy confidence that many adults, and corporations, could learn from. Frankly it’s not about budgets or slogans, it’s about values. The school is investing time and resources - cue me hanging yards of rainbow bunting in the playground - because this support matters.
Pride was never meant to be a marketing opportunity. It began as a protest, a joyful resistance, and a collective declaration of identity and belonging in a world that often denied both. That some companies have retreated this year is telling but it’s also clarifying. It reminds us who was really in it for the cause, and who just wanted the clicks. Maybe we should stop looking up to brands for validation and start looking around, to our communities, our classrooms, our chosen families and remind ourselves that Pride starts with us.
'Do Ask. Do Tell: Queer Life, Love and Culture Laid Bare' by Stu Oakley and Lotte Jeffs is out now.
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