General Motors has committed to increasing advertising spending on Black-owned media companies.
It is understood that General Motors chief executive Mary Barra had planned to meet with leaders of seven Black-owned media companies on Thursday after the group ran a full-page ad in both the Detroit Free Press and The Wall Street Journal accusing Barra of ignoring multiple requests for meetings.
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Auto News reports that this meeting has been postponed and instead, GM will hold a “series of meetings” with Black-owned media companies in the next few weeks.
“We’re in the process of scheduling those now,” GM spokesman Patrick Morrissey said in a statement. “We’re trying to schedule them as soon as possible and hopefully have them within the next few weeks.”
The carmaker plans to increase Black-owned media company advertising spending to 4 per cent by 2022 and 8 per cent by 2025.
A goal of the group is to get GM to invest specifically in Black-owned media, not just minority-owned media.
“Minority includes white women and large corporations like General Motors can hide behind and tout their minority records while continuing not to do business with Black Owned Media companies,” they wrote.
General Motors says it has doubled ad spending on Black-owned media to 2 per cent in 2021 and works with Black-owned media groups including American Urban Radio Networks, Black Enterprise, Revolt Media, Steed Media Group, Central City Productions, Ozy, Essence Magazine, Urban One, and Howard Stirk Holdings.
