NOOSE FOUND HANGING AT MILLERCOORS SHENANDOAH BREWERY

Latest Incident Underscores An Ongoing Pattern Of Discrimination Towards African American Employees At The Beer Company

By Dorothy Leavell

July 2 , 2010

African American Employees At The Beer Company Chicago, Il (June 30, 2010)…. The National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) strongly denounced today the MillerCoors Brewing Company for its discriminatory culture and negative treatment of African American employees. For the second time in a little more than 12 months a noose has been found hanging at a MillerCoors Brewery. On April 28, 2010, a noose was found hanging with an African American figurine wearing a baseball cap in the Shenandoah Virginia Brewery. Representatives at MillerCoors have confirmed that the incident is racially motivated and may be part of a bi-racial love triangle. “It is clear that there is a climate and culture at MillerCoors that is increasingly anti African American which continues to foster these types of racial activities” stated Danny J. Bakewell Sr., Chairman of NNPA. In February 2009 another noose was found hanging in the Shenandoah Virginia Brewery, at which time the company’s Chief People Officer, Steve Woodward, administered diversity and sensitivity training to all plant employees; however no one was terminated or officially reprimanded for the incident. No police report was filed during this latest noose incident and to date no employees have been terminated.

A third noose was also found in early 2009 in the company’s Golden, Colorado Brewery. Shenandoah has approximately 140 employees of which 35 are African American. “A noose is the absolute worse symbol of hatred aimed at our community. MillerCoors needs to understand that this unacceptable one time, so I can’t imagine it occurring multiple times” Bakewell added. Danny J. Bakewell, Sr., newly elected Chairman of the National Newspaper Publishers Association, also historically known as The Black Press of America, is a Los Angeles- based real estate developer, philanthropist, financier, and executive publisher of The Los Angeles Sentinel. He is also a board member of The National Black Economic Development Coalition (NBEDC) which has an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with MillerCoors focused on African American employee leadership and development along with a number of other key areas of focus. Stanley E. Washington NBEDC Board Chairman, commented, “We began working with MillerCoors, the new company, in 2009 and I think that we have made some good incremental steps over the past year and a half. At that time, the MillerCoors African American marketing budget was only $7.5 million and not tied to the company’s general market messaging. In 2010 we were able to increase the budget to $20.6 million with a focus on more responsible marketing of main stream brands. We are also very proud of the work we’ve begun to accomplish together over the last year in supplier diversity.”

MillerCoors is America’s second largest brewing company with nearly 30% of the market generating over $8 billion annually. The company, which was formed in July 2008, is a joint venture between (South African Brewing) SABMiller ($26 billion globally) and MolsonCoors ($12 billion globally). MillerCoors has eight major U.S. breweries and slightly over 8,000 employees. An estimated 23% or $1.8 billion of the company’s annual revenues are African American, yet MillerCoors spends less than 1% or $21 million of its $1 billion annual marketing budget on African American targeted marketing and advertising. MillerCoors has over forty-eight malt beverage brands including the flagship brands Coors Light and Miller Lite, each with sizeable African American market share, 19% and 22%, of premium light share respectively. Additionally, of the top six malt liquor brands distributed, MillerCoors distributes four including: Ole English, Steel Reserve, Mickey’s and Magnum. These products are marketed almost exclusively to African Americans and are recognized to heavily contribute to the erosion of low income, underserved African American communities.

Of equal concern is the company’s lack of African American Vice Presidents. Last year MillerCoors communicated that of the 14 African American Directors currently in the company, that they did not believe any were capable of becoming Vice Presidents within the next two years even though several of the Directors have ten years or more tenure with each legacy organization. “During my first Coalition meeting with MillerCoors CEO Leo Kiely, he made a personal commitment to address the company’s obvious gap of African American senior leadership. We are still waiting for the company to keep a promise that we took seriously,” stated Bakewell. NNPA was a founding member of the NBEDC, formed in 1984, to help corporations implement policies and programs that allow African Americans to fully participate in economic and business opportunities. The group initially began working with the Coors Brewing Company in response to racially motivated and disparaging comments from a member of the Coors family which resulted in a national African American selective buying campaign against the company.

In January 2009, following the merger between Coors Brewing Company and Miller Brewing, the Coalition entered into a three-year Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with MillerCoors Brewing Company to focus on the areas of leadership and workforce; marketing and advertising; community investment; distributor ownership development; retailers and procurement. “We are meeting with MillerCoors President Tom Long and its Senior leaders today and will communicate that the time for ineffective talk has passed, we want to know now what the company is doing to change its culture of institutional discrimination” commented Bakewell. National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) is a trade organization of 200 plus African American owned newspapers in 42 states across the nation. NNPA speaks to more than 19 million readers per week and is headquartered in Washington, D.C. For additional information please visit www.nnpa.org. The National Black Economic Development Coalition (NBEDC) is a coalition of top civil rights, economic, business and community organizations including: the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Rainbow/ PUSH Coalition, the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), the California Package Store and Tavern Owners Association (CAL-PAC), and other civil rights groups and trade associations.