Macy’s: “Highly recommended.”
Amazon: “Better options are available.”
Home Depot: “Please shop elsewhere.”
Those reviews aren’t talking about customer service. Instead, the rankings belong to a new startup sizing up companies’ political contributions to Democrats.
The Washington D.C.-based startup, Progressive Shopper, has set out to mine political spending from hundreds of major brands. The site shows shoppers what percentage of a company’s political spending went to Democrats and Republicans in the 2018 and 2016 election cycles. If a company is deemed too far in the red, Progressive Shopper offers a list of competitors from a more left-leaning brand. So far, co-founders Mark Hanis and Van Chappell have culled data from more than 500 companies – from Walmart to T-Mobile to General Motors.
Progressive Shopper, which launched this month, arrives as a slew of companies have come under pressure to either distance themselves from charged political issues or take a stand. In November, Walmart, Boston Scientific and Union Pacific all asked for returns on donations to Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi.
Over the past year, Greyhound was pulled into debates over the White House’s immigration policy as Border Patrol agents continued to search its buses. And after 17 people were killed at a Parkland, Florida, high school, a slew of companies cut ties with the National Rifle Association or changed their policies on gun sales.
The site doesn’t hide its liberal tilt – the logo is a jumping donkey with a shopping bag in its mouth. But Hanis and Chappell say they felt urged by Donald Trump’s presidency to show shoppers how their favorite brands stand up politically.
“We realized pretty quickly that people shop far more than they vote, far more than they donate, more than they advocate or lobby,” Hanis said. “This was an amazing opportunity … to get people to take progressive action through their consumer behavior.”
Political donations made by corporations and their employees are all publicly available through the Federal Election Commission. But those records are kept in databases that aren’t very user friendly.
Even for shoppers who lean to the right, Hanis and Chappell said there’s value to having this information out there for easy reference.
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