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Are boycotts effective?

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Jasmine Owens
By
Jasmine Owens

In this article, we explore what boycotts can achieve and their impact – whether that’s denting the finances of a company, showing solidarity with workers, or ensuring media reports on an issue.
 

For decades, boycott campaigns have targeted companies, products and institutions over animal rights abuses, mistreatment of workers or other political and social issues – generating massive impacts across sectors.

Boycott campaigns can occasionally cause a company’s revenue to fall, making it harder for unethical activities to continue. Often, though, they also have other aims and objectives that aren’t purely financial — for example generating publicity and attention around a key issue.

Below we list a range of different ways boycotts can create change, with examples of previous successes. 

1) Boycotting is a strong way to voice your opposition

Boycotts are a clear way to say you object, and nearly everyone immediately understands what you mean when you say you’re boycotting a brand or event, for example.

It’s a clear red line: you feel so strongly that you’ll have nothing to do with the target of your boycott, and you are not afraid to be vocal about it. 
 

Example: Nestlé 

Baby Milk Action first called a boycott of Nestlé in 1977, and since then the global campaign has targeted the company over its aggressive sale and marketing of milk formula to new mothers. It’s been accused of "contributing to the unnecessary death and suffering of infants" through its aggressive marketing practices, which campaigners allege promote baby milk formula as a superior option to breastfeeding. Read more about the Nestlé boycott in Ethical Consumer’s boycotts list.

In the 1980s, the World Health Organisation introduced new guidance on the marketing of baby milk formulas to ensure companies were in line with vital health recommendations. Nestlé says that it’s compliant with the code, and points out that some boycott campaigns against the company have been dropped since the guidance was introduced. You can read Nestle’s full response to the boycott calls on its website.

However, the International Baby Food Action Network, a coalition of public interest groups, still monitor baby milk marketing worldwide, and Baby Milk Action states that Nestlé “pretends to be Code compliant, yet in all the independent monitoring reports it is found to violate the Code the most.” It continues the boycott call.

Nestlé owns a large number of brands, from After Eights to Yorkie bars, and breakfast cereals to cat food. Boycotting Nestlé products is a straightforward way to show you disagree with its activities. 

2) Boycotts can pressure big corporations to change

People working in the marketing department of a major corporation are likely to be pretty concerned if they open an email from a major NGO that says they are organising a boycott campaign.

Unsurprisingly, companies do not want to be linked to boycotts – it’s really bad press. Boycott campaigns can generate huge amounts of negative publicity very quickly. So companies may work hard to avoid a boycott campaign being launched against them, or to make it end quickly. This might mean giving into some of the campaigners’ demands.

Media officer at animal rights organisation PETA, Lucy Watson, says, “Unlike softer campaign tactics, boycotts can be a useful strategy to persuade companies to do better because they can threaten a company’s revenue and reputation.”

Example: Nike

The global boycott of Nike in the 1990s was so successful that it has become a lesson in how activists can force giant corporations to improve their practices if they get enough bad press.

Facing abysmal working conditions within Nike’s supply chain, trade unions in Indonesia decided to call for a boycott of Nike until workers got a fairer deal. Ethical Consumer and a range of other organisations formed a European coalition to develop a strong and coordinated boycott campaign.

Nike did eventually make some significant changes: acknowledging that it had a responsibility for workers in its supply chain, committing to auditing, and publishing more transparent information about conditions faced by supply chain workers. Nike still faces criticisms for workers’ rights issues and auditing has proven to be largely ineffective, but these changes nonetheless show that a massive corporation like Nike could be forced to respond.

Other sports brands also improved their practices to be aligned with Nike’s – potentially afraid that, otherwise, they might be targeted by campaigners next. The campaign against Nike not only improved the company’s own practices but pushed up expectations within the broader leisurewear sector too.

3) Boycotts are a way to show solidarity

With human rights abuses in particular, boycotts are a way to show solidarity.

When international bodies such as the UN fail to ensure human rights resolutions are upheld, individual citizens, organisations or even states might decide to take matters into their own hands – by boycotting or cutting ties with the unethical actor or activities.

This can be a way to show solidarity, and build pressure calling for the restoration of human rights. 
 

Showing solidarity examples

Perhaps the most famous boycott was against South Africa in opposition to the apartheid. 

South African exiles and their supporters called for a boycott of products from the country in 1959, in protest against the racial segregation enforced by white colonial politicians and discrimination and violence against Black people in the country. The boycott initially focused on fruit and vegetables, but later targeted chains like Marks & Spencer and Next, causing some companies to pull South African products from their shelves.

For the next 35 years, the boycott was a central part of the anti-apartheid campaign. After decades of grassroots organising – as well as pressure from international leaders – apartheid in South Africa was ended in 1994.

In 2005, Palestinian civil society launched the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, inspired directly by the South African boycott campaign. For nearly 20 years it has run organised campaigns against a small and strategic selection of brands and institutions that are connected to the Israeli state’s ongoing violations of Palestinian human rights.

People around the world have responded to this call for a boycott from Palestinians, as one way to show solidarity from afar. The BDS movement also calls on people to identify boycott targets within their own countries and communities.

Read about the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement.

Similarly, the Ukrainian government immediately called for a boycott of Russia following the invasion. 

This resulted in well over 1,000 international companies officially withdrawing from Russia, and was a way for individuals and companies to demonstrate condemnation of the invasion, and support for Ukrainians.

4) Boycotts can bring down entire industries

Boycott campaigns can help generate enough attention to bring down entire industries, by revealing that a sector people used to think of as unproblematic is actually riddled with ethical problems.

There are lots of examples of this type of success in the animal rights movement.

Ending unethical industries

For over a decade PETA campaigned for wild-animal circuses to be banned across the UK and Ireland, calling on people to "never" attend a show that involved wild animals. Scotland, Wales, England, and the Republic and Ireland all subsequently passed legislation banning wild-animal circuses in their jurisdictions.

Media officer at animal rights organisation PETA, Lucy Watson, says, “wild-animal circuses are a thing of the past in the UK, largely because people voted with their wallets and stopped financially supporting attractions that exploit animals.”

Similarly, PETA called for a boycott of SeaWorld in the US since at least 2012, calling on the company to stop breeding and keeping orcas captive for entertainment purposes. In 2013 the documentary Blackfish was released, which discussed orca captivity.

Following the boycott call, attendance at SeaWorld dropped by 17%, and shares fell 51%. 

In 2016, SeaWorld announced it would end orca breeding programmes and committed to phasing out all orca whale shows.

5) Boycotts can dent a company’s finances

As the above SeaWorld example shows, boycott campaigns can have a real economic impact, leading to, for example, reduced sales or a drop in share prices. 

Sometimes money is what a company understands more than people and ethics.

Examples of financial pressure from boycotts

One of the earliest examples of a successful campaign was the boycott in Britain of sugar produced by slaves. In 1791, after Parliament refused to abolish slavery, activists printed thousands of pamphlets encouraging the boycott.

Sales of sugar dropped by between a third and a half. By contrast sales of Indian sugar, which were not linked to slavery, rose tenfold in two years.

Many of the people who were active in supporting this boycott went on to become involved in the abolition and other reform movements, and the publicity generated by the boycott helped to put abolitionism on the election agenda in Britain.

The Alabama bus boycott in the US is another famous historical example. In 1955 Rosa Parks refused a bus driver's order to leave a row of four seats in the "colored" section and move to the back of the bus after the white section had filled up. Her defiance sparked a successful boycott of buses in the area, with residents instead carpooling, riding in Black-owned cabs, or walking, some as far as 20 miles. 

The boycott caused the bus company's profits to crash, as dozens of public buses stood idle for months. The company lost between 30,000 and 40,000 bus fares each day during the boycott. 

In 2022 the coalition Stop Toxic Twitter, comprised of around 60 civil rights organisations, wrote an open letter asking Twitter’s top 20 advertisers to "cease all advertising on Twitter globally" while the platform’s owner Elon Musk failed to uphold community standards and ensure that offensive, misleading or violent content was moderated. 

Twitter has since lost half its advertising revenue, with over 500 advertisers stopping spending on the platform.

Musk has responded to the boycott calls on multiple occasions, including accusing advertisers of “unlawfully” boycotting the site and saying it had deprived the platform of “billions of dollars” in revenue.

6) Boycotts keep stories in the public eye

Boycott campaigns can provide a new angle and developments on long standing issues, generating lots of fresh media coverage.

For example, a newspaper might publish one article when a boycott campaign is launched, another when it starts getting a lot of support, and another when it finally achieves its goal.

Example: Settlements and Baillie Gifford

For over 70 years the Israeli state has violated Palestinians’ basic human rights. One way it does this is by building illegal settlements on Palestinian land. These settlements have been well-documented – sadly meaning that their existence is no longer considered newsworthy.

But when campaigners started accusing the investment management company Baillie Gifford of being linked to settlements, they generated a lot of new attention and brought the issue of settlements back into public attention.

In 2023, Scotland-based investment firm Baillie Gifford was listed as one of the top 50 European investors in illegal Israeli settlements, in a report by the human rights coalition Don’t Buy into Occupation. It was found to have investments in companies linked to the Israeli state and illegal settlements, including a travel company, construction company, and US tech company that has Israeli subsidiaries.

Over 200 authors, from Naomi Klein to Sally Rooney, signed a statement by the collective of literary industry workers Fossil Free Books (FFB) demanding that Baillie Gifford cease its investments in fossil fuels and companies that profit from "Israeli apartheid, occupation and genocide" and calling for a boycott of the company until it did so.

As a result of this, the firm was dropped as a sponsor by multiple arts and literary events in May 2024, including the Hay Festival and Edinburgh International Book Festival. Sponsorship of book festivals in Borders, Wimbledon, Cheltenham, Cambridge, Stratford, Wigtown, and Henley was cancelled by Ballie Gifford following protests.

This boycott generated a vast amount of news articles, all of which highlighted the issue of settlements.

Baillie Gifford responded to say that it's misleading to say it's invested in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and says it is a business "managing other people's money, not our own".

Read our guide to Ethical Investment Funds.

7) Boycott campaigns can achieve their goals

Boycott campaigns often have very clear, well-thought out, strategic goals.

Some of the most successful boycott campaigns are designed around demands that are realistic and practical, and could succeed if enough people join the campaign and help build pressure.

Example: Puma

In 2018, the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign called for a boycott of Puma, with a really clear objective: for Puma to stop sponsoring the Israeli Football Association which had teams that operated in illegal Israeli settlements on Palestinian land.

The BDS movement made it clear that if Puma stopped sponsoring the IFA then the boycott call would end. This was a tangible and realistic goal, which mobilised a lot of people into action. In 2023, Puma announced that it would not renew its sponsorship contract with Israeli football team.

Puma claims the decision was not made in response to the boycott call, and was instead a response to “certain KPIs”. But BDS celebrated the decision as a major campaign victory. 

8) Boycotts can create impact with few resources

While long-term pressure building campaigns, publicity stunts, demonstrations and many other ways to create change take a lot of time, energy and skills, calling for a boycott can be done by anyone. 

And because boycotting is such a bold statement, it can be enough to spark bigger campaign efforts and rally others to use lots of different tactics.
 

Example: California grape boycott

In the 1960s, grape workers in California, who were mostly migrants, routinely worked in abusive conditions for very low pay.

According to Rob Harrison, a co-founder of Ethical Consumer, “They had nothing to lose and were already hungry”, and so they called for a boycott of Californian grapes, demanding better pay.

The boycott campaign tactic proved very successful: it was one of the first US examples where consumers backed a boycott call led by workers.

For example, in December 1965 the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA) called for a boycott of Schenley Industries, the second largest grape grower in Delano, which was a well-known brand for selling liquor. The boycott resulted in the company’s sales dropping significantly by April 1966, and eventually brought the company to the bargaining table to sign a historic labour agreement with the NFWA that same month.

9) Boycotts provide quantifiable evidence of opposition

Boycott campaigns can help to show the scale of opposition to an issue, in a way that can be quantified. For example, a company might face a drop in revenue or share value, or multiple bands might pull out of a music festival over dodgy sponsorship.

Many boycott campaigns now also ask consumers to pledge their support online, letting them tell a company or brand exactly how many people will be avoiding their products. 

Example: Stop Funding Hate

In August 2016, Stop Funding Hate called on companies to stop paying for advertising space in newspapers whose headlines and articles had become increasingly hateful, most notably towards migrants, such as the Daily Express.

The increasing number of companies that had signed up to Stop Funding Hate’s list of ethical advertisers, provided quantifiable evidence of people’s opposition to divisive or hateful media.

In response, the Daily Express changed its practices. In 2016, the paper had over 70 front pages featuring migrants, the majority of which were negative. But in the first half of 2018, after Stop Funding Hate had influenced many companies to pull their advertisements, the Daily Express published only three of this type of front page.

10) Boycotts boost morale

While stories about how dire a situation is are important, it can be a big boost to morale to see that people are organising and taking action to try to do something about it.

Boycotts provide an easy way for people around the world to get involved in showing support – helping counteract the feeling of powerlessness many experience around social and environmental issues.

Example: Ethical Consumer’s boycott of Amazon

Ethical Consumer has run a boycott campaign against Amazon since 2012 over its eggregious tax avoidance, and provides advice on how individuals can avoid using Amazon and take action against it. Ethical Consumer is also part of the Make Amazon Pay coalition, which brings together unions, campaigners, and civil society organisations, to take a stand against the company’s poor record on workers rights, monopolisation of markets, and tax avoidance among other issues.

Boycotting the company as much as possible, and refusing to order deliveries from it, is a way to feel like you’re taking action. This alone is unlikely to make Amazon’s ethics improve, but by learning about the reasons to boycott, speaking up about boycotting publicly, and supporting other companies that are operating more ethically you become part of a broader movement.

By boycotting the company, we are taking part in a global movement and building the pressure for Amazon – or the legislation that allows its abuses – to change.

11) Boycotts can educate new audiences

When celebrities, brands, or organisations that are well-known join a boycott call, their fans or customers might want to know why. This can make people who wouldn’t otherwise be aware of an issue start to ask what it’s all about. 

Example: Sally Rooney and Palestine

In October 2021, bestselling author Sally Rooney refused to allow her new book to be translated and sold by the Israeli publishing company Modan. She could not, she said, "accept a new contract with an Israeli company that does not publicly distance itself from apartheid and support the UN-stipulated rights of the Palestinian people.”

Rooney said she would be “pleased and proud” to publish the book in Hebrew if she could find a way to do so that was compliant with the boycott call led by Palestinians.

Rooney’s British and Irish publisher (Faber & Faber) has sold over six million copies of her books, so they reach a lot of people. Many readers may have been curious when they heard about the boycott, and have gone on to learn her reasons for it.

12) Boycotts are one tool in a campaign toolkit

Boycotts are more powerful if they’re combined with lots of other campaign strategies, and it’s rare to see a boycott call being the only strategy campaigners are using. 
 

Example: PETA and dog breeding

Animal rights group PETA is campaigning to stop the breeding of unhealthy dogs. One of the tactics it’s using to try to achieve this goal is calling for a boycott of the dog show Crufts on Channel 4, which features lots of heavily-bred dogs with health issues.

But PETA is doing much more than just calling for a boycott. It’s also:

  • Publishing: writing articles about animal suffering caused by dog breeding.
  • Investigating: publishing exposes.
  • Petitions: creating petitions people can sign.
  • Protesting: activists have turned up at dog breeding events with banners.
  • Collaborating: it worked with vets, who spoke up about the harmful impacts of dog breeding.
  • Campaigning for legislative changes.
Crowd of people on demonstration with placard which says "No".

Boycott List

Visit our boycotts list to find all the active boycott campaigns facing consumer brands in the UK today.

This list features organised boycotts by recognised groups.

Boycott list

Also of interest

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