Top black celebs perform free for Walmart

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Positive images of Walmart

The Obama administration has worked with the international sales behemoth to promote issues such as the president’s health care plan. According to a 2009 report from the Associated Press, Walmart supported the president’s Affordable Care Act by publicly endorsing the idea that large retailers should provide insurance to employees, an idea central to the health care overhaul. President Obama has also recently appointed Sylvia Mathews Burwell, the most recent former head of the Walmart Foundation, as the director of the Office of Management and Budget.

First lady Michelle Obama is also working with Walmart to promote healthy eating. After announcing that her Let’s Move campaign will partner with Walmart to fight childhood obesity, the company committed to a five-year plan to reduce fat, salt and sugar in its house brands, and encourage other brands it carries to do the same. In March 2013, the first lady praised Walmart for its efforts to promote good nutrition from a Walmart store in Springfield, MO, a town that was battling over whether to build an additional Walmart in its historic downtown at the time.

Walmart’s high-profile support of some Obama administration initiatives may have made the public more aware of the company’s charitable efforts.

In another move, likely to demonstrate sensitivity, Walmart ended its relationship with Southern celebrity chef Paula Deen in the wake of revelations that she had used racial slurs in the past.

Despite these actions, not all headlines about Walmart have been positive,

Negative press plagues the retailer

On August 7, it was reported that Walmart has agreed to pay $190,000 to fix hazards uncovered during an inspection by the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) at a Rochester, N.Y. store. Workers there and at Walmart stores nationwide who work with trash compactors and cleaning chemicals will soon receive training and upgraded working conditions as part of Walmart’s settlement with OSHA. Walmart agreed to implement changes at its 2,857 Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club stores to improve worker safety.

OUR Walmart, a union-backed group of company employees, issued a statement in response to the OSHA ruling. It said, “This is just the latest indication of Walmart’s malfeasance throughout the supply chain, and these serious problems represent a major danger to workers, the environment, and the company’s future. As workers we routinely face inadequate fire safety measures, including blocked fire exits, and do not receive proper training on how to safely handle hazardous chemicals.”

Randy Hargrove, Walmart spokesman, said the company has had long standing policies to ensure employees’ safety. “When we learned of the concerns raised by OSHA at our Rochester store in 2011, we immediately addressed them and reinforced the company’s guidelines,” he said.

After a November 2012 factory fire in Bangladesh, and a factory building collapse in another part of that country in April 2013, Walmart corporate execs were on the defensive. Revelations surfaced that suppliers there had violated Walmart goals not to engage with negligent partners. In those cases, Walmart ended its affiliations with those suppliers, and in July 2013 signed the Bangladesh Worker Safety Initiative which, in addition to providing independent oversight of factories, will be funded by Walmart and other signatory retailers.

In recent months, Walmart workers have gone on strike to protest what they describe as poverty-level wages and poor working conditions.

In addition, recent lawsuits have alleged gender and racial discrimination in hiring, promotion and firing at the retailer.

The Supreme Court struck down a class action lawsuit last year brought on behalf of 1.5 million women who allegedly accused Walmart of gender bias. It would have been one of the biggest job discrimination cases in U.S. history. The Supreme Court ruled that the suit did not have class action status in part because the group was too large.

As a result, the women’s lawyers related to this case have been filing smaller “regional” discrimination lawsuits, including cases in California and Florida.

A U.S. District judge ruled this month that the new case in California involving 150,000 women was still too big.

Walmart released a statement in response saying that it, “is pleased that today’s ruling rejects the attempt of a few associates to turn their individual complaints into a sweeping and unwarranted class action. As the U.S. Supreme Court recognized in 2012, these claims are unsuitable for class treatment because each individual’s situation is so different.  We’ve said all along that if someone believes they have been treated unfairly, they deserve to have their timely, individual claims heard in court.”

In 2009, Walmart paid $17.5 million to settle a suit alleging the company had discriminated against African-American job applicants.  Walmart denied it engaged in any unlawful discrimination, and said settling the suit was in its best interest.

On the environmental front, the company was fined $82 million earlier this year for dumping hazardous waste in California and Missouri. In this criminal case, the retailer was charged with six counts of violating the Clean Water Act in California and one count of violating a federal law related to pesticide disposal in Missouri. Walmart pled guilty on all counts. Investigators brought the charges after employees were found throwing hazardous products in the trash and into sewage systems. “We have fixed the problem,” Wal-Mart spokeswoman Brooke Buchanan said. “We are obviously happy that this is the final resolution.”

But despite instances where workers either have expressed dissatisfaction or where their actions have gotten the company into hot water, Walmart enjoys large public displays of worker support, such as the rally attended by thousands that took place during this year’s shareholders’ meeting.

Do celebrities understand what they support?

Such examples might prompt the public to question how these controversies impact the decision of celebrities to support Walmart at annual shareholders’ meetings.

Syracuse’s Dr. Robert Thompson said that, even for those stars who may have reservations about publicly supporting Walmart, the benefits of their corporate “cheerleading” outweigh the drawbacks.

“I don’t normally associate Will Smith with showing up for free to promote a company that’s got labor issues,” Thompson said. “So all I can think is that Walmart is the powerfully important partner with them for what they do. They’re the ones that actually move product off the shelf in an [Internet] era when moving things off the shelf is becoming less and less the model.”

Yet, many stars do not see personal appearances for Walmart at shareholders’ meetings as a statement of personal alignment with the company.

For some, these events are perceived in a similar vein to a celebrity’s attendance at a marketing event for a fee, which is a very common occurrence, and one that most fans don’t associate with intimate involvement with a brand. But, instead of a fee, stars receive product sales and favorable product placement.

Walmart is in thousands of communities, reaches out with charitable enterprises and is an attractive retailer because of low price points on its goods and commodities. Most would argue that this is why millions of Americans shop at Walmart. So it may be hard to apply a more stringent standard to celebrities than you would to the average consumer walking through Walmart’s doors, experts quoted in this article say.

“In general, celebrities are not that well-informed about some of the policies of these companies,” said Duke’s Dr. Mark Anthony Neal. “I’m sure if you were to randomly ask any of them about the labor practices of Walmart, or any other of these companies, that’s generally something they don’t know much about.”

Stars: Not trying to be political

“Many of them aren’t trying to be political at all in any way, because it breeds controversy, and controversy can disrupt your brand,” Neal added. “So in their minds,” he said they may be thinking, “’I’m just simply performing at this particular event; I’m not necessarily co-signing their practices at all.’”

Marvet Britto echoes that sentiment. “When you’re being asked to endorse a brand, it’s a little bit different from being asked to perform for and engage boards of directors,” she said. “In an artist’s mind, that is a coup for them. That is a prestigious ask, if you will, because it is one that is noteworthy. It is not one that every celebrity gets. So, they think that there is a certain level of honor, a certain level of cachet, that goes with being invited. That’s something that is only extended to top-tier, A-list talent. They’re not looking at that singular invitation as a global endorsement of a brand and its practices. They are looking at it as an in-kind trade of equity. You are allowing me a place in your business, a platform from which to sell my product, and in exchange I am going to lend you my services for an evening, an afternoon, etc.”

Some stars, theGrio found, while lacking knowledge of the allegations against Walmart, may perform for the company largely in support of its philanthropic efforts. Last year, Walmart donated over a billion dollars in cash and in-kind contributions to charity.

“Many artists just look at that as an in-kind trade for their services, not an endorsement,” Britto concluded. “They see it differently.”

TheGrio reached out to Walmart for comment on the negative allegations against the company described in this story. Walmart responded via email that the company declines to comment in order “to focus on more timely issues impacting our customers and associates.”

The celebrities mentioned in this story either declined to comment on it, or did not respond to theGrio by publication time.

Follow Lauren Carter on Twitter at @ByLaurenCarter