Supermarket chain Sainsbury’s stopped advertisements on the centre-right upstart GB News network after a woke pressure campaign against prime time host Nigel Farage, despite his show being a ratings success.
The left-wing activist group Led by Donkeys launched a Sleeping Giants-style campaign against GB News, pressuring Sainsbury’s to drop their advertisements with the recently founded anti-woke news network.
Led by Donkeys, which gained prominence as an anti-Brexit campaign group, erected billboards and parked an ad van outside the supermarket chain’s headquarters demanding to know “Why it pays Nigel Farage’s salary by advertising on his TV show?”
The campaign apparently worked, with the activist group writing on Friday evening: “After a couple of billboards, an advan at their HQ, more than 2.5 million views on films, and escalating pressure, Sainsbury’s did the right thing.”
“Huge thanks to everyone who contacted @sainsburys, to the volunteers at @StopFundingHate who’ve been monitoring the channel and to the staff at the supermarket as well for pushing for this change,” Led by Donkeys added.
On Friday evening, Sainsbury’s confirmed in a reply to a customer that it had ended its advertising campaign with GB News.
The supermarket later claimed in a statement per Indy 100: “We are a non-political organisation. We advertise across a wide range of media outlets, including TV to reach all of our customers.
“Our latest multi-channel TV campaign, which has now ended, included a very small number of ads appearing during the GB News programme. Our customers’ feedback is very important to us, and we continue to regularly review our marketing activity.”
GB News, which was founded by former BBC host Andrew Neil, has faced attempts to pressure its advertisers even before it was officially launched in June.
The left-wing cancel culture group ‘Stop Funding Hate’ launched a campaing against the anti-woke news network, successfully pressuring Swedish cider-maker Kopparberg, Ikea, Nivea, Specsavers, and Grolsch to drop their advertisements from the fledgling network.
Andrew Neil blasted the moves from the advertisers, saying: “Woke nonsense has reached the boardroom and corporate capitalism is becoming the useful idiot of bigots bent on censorship.
“GB News viewers are incensed with advertisers who’ve taken against us. Many have written to tell them so. And their numbers are growing. For three nights in a row this show has been the number one rated show on any news channel available in the UK,” Neil pointed out.
While the network faced early technical troubles as well as a backlash after one of its presenters took the knee live on air, GB News has seen a resurgence since the hiring of Brexit champion Nigel Farage in a prime time slot.
Last week, Mr Farage’s programme beat out both Sky News and BBC combined in the ratings.
Follow Kurt Zindulka on Twitter here @KurtZindulka