Andres Talavera de Conill
According to Conill’s Junior Content Strategist Andres Talavera, the pandemic plus the consequent quarantine and the demonstrations calling for racial justice and equality have accelerated an evolution of consumer behavior. A sense of wokeness, a political term of African-American origin that means being aware of social issues such as the struggle against racism, “has amplified and is driving people deeper into the ethics, actions and history of a brand,” Adforum wrote in an article. Talavera notes that as a result of the Black Lives Matter movement, many brands have made important efforts to be more woke in their practices, including commitments to diversify their leadership teams, update advertising practices to make them more inclusive and even design plans to aid neglected communities. He gave as examples Target, which according to data from DiversityInc has two-thirds more Latinos in high administration posts than the national average, and Coca-Cola, “which has proven its commitment to Hispanic employees by covering the $500 DACA renovation fee for anyone who is part of the program.” “Consumers are putting their money where their values are. We might be entering a point of no return, where decisions to purchase a product or service are made based on the behavior and actions of the company offering it,” he said.