Walgreens U.K. subsidiary, Boots, joins Target and Bud Light as the latest brand to face backlash from far right-wing groups online as DEI increasingly becomes a third-rail issue for brands.
The pharmacy and beauty brand’s holiday ad, which stars Bridgerton actor, Adjoa Andoh, as Mrs. Claus, has become the target of conservative criticism over its casting and use of gender-inclusive pronouns.
The spot shows Andoh’s Mrs. Claus stepping into her living room only to find her husband, Santa Claus, fast asleep in front of the fire. So she takes Christmas into her own hands, getting her “elfluencers” to assist. At one point she refers to one of the elves featured as “them.”
The work has prompted division on platforms including X and Facebook, leading to a trending hashtag on the former, #BoycottBoots, and an accompanying petition from far-right group Britain First (previously banned from Facebook for “inciting hatred and animosity,”) calling on U.K. shoppers to avoid the retailer.
The group called the ad “sickeningly woke” for the way it portrayed a heterosexual Santa Claus. It also described Andoh as “anti-white racist,” referring to comments she made in 2023 about the Royal Family being “terribly white” during King Charles III’s coronation.
On X, Darren Grimes, a right-wing political commentator and GB News host, expressed similar opinions: “The ad stars actress Adjoa Andoh, who famously described the white Royal Family on the Buckingham Palace balcony as ‘terribly white’. It references ‘they/them’ pronouns. Uses woke TikTok ‘influencers’. And naturally, Santa, as a white bloke, is a lazy bum,” he wrote.
In September, stock in Boots’ parent firm, Walgreens-Boots Alliance (WBA), noted a 64% year-on-year drop owing to squeezed profit margins. Over the last seven days, against the curtain of right-wing backlash, the company’s share price has continued to decline, decreasing by 5.59%.
In a post viewed 2.7 million times, one critic with 61,800 followers on X (@InevitableWest) claimed the negative reaction to the ad had driven Walgreens’ share price down. However, no direct link between the ad and WBA stock performance has been confirmed.
ADWEEK reached out to Boots for a statement, but it did not respond at the time of writing.
Brands retreat from representation
Boots, which is signed up to the Equality Index run by the LGBTQ+ charity Stonewall, is among a string of brands this year that have come in the firing line right-wing activists.
