LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – Liquor giant Brown-Forman Corp. joined the chorus of corporations speaking out about racial injustice following protests around the country decrying the police killings of unarmed African-Americans.
“The events happening across America have highlighted yet again the disturbing and systemic racism that persists in the United States,” Brown-Forman CEO Lawson Whiting said during the company’s quarterly earnings call on Wednesday.
Whiting did not explicitly mention the police shooting of Louisville resident Breonna Taylor or George Floyd, the man who police choked to death in Minneapolis.
But he said “recent events” have “sparked” fresh conversations about racial equality at the Louisville-based spirits company, which is controlled by Louisville’s Brown family.
“While we have been diligent in our diversity and inclusion, we all know there is more to be done,” Whiting said.
So what is Brown-Forman doing? Whiting said the company:
- Is leading Greater Louisville Inc.’s new “Racism & Business Council” (GLI, the metro chamber of commerce, said Monday that Ralph De Chabert, Brown-Forman’s chief diversity inclusion and global community relations officer, will co-chair the group, which is focused “on how oppression and injustice impacts local communities of color.”)
- Forming a “partnership” in the name of Nearest Green, the African-American original master distiller of Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Whiskey, aimed at “development opportunities” for black people in the distilling industry and helping black-led distilling ventures.
- Being “better neighbors” in the largely black California neighborhood, where Brown-Forman maintains its corporate headquarters. Whiting said Brown-Forman will commit unspecified “resources” in the coming months to the “Invest California initiative,” which aims to improve education, economic development and wealth-creation in the neighborhood. Whiting said Brown-Forman has donated $6 million in the last three years to nearby causes such as the new Republic Bank Foundation YMCA branch and historically black Simmons College.
Pandemic weighs on sales
The company on Wednesday said the coronavirus pandemic hammered its business in March and April, leading to a lackluster finish to the company’s fiscal year ended April 30.
As recently as December, Brown-Forman told stock analysts to expect sales, adjusted for certain items, to grow about 5% to 7% over the previous year. Instead, the company’s net sales were basically unchanged at $3.4 billion.
While Brown-Forman got some boost from consumers stocking up on booze for home consumption, it wasn't enough to offset the collapse of liquor sales at bars, restaurants and airports during March and April, executives said.
With sporadic reopening plans and a possible second wave of the virus, Brown-Forman said the business environment was too uncertain to give analysts sales and profit predictions in the 2021 fiscal year.
In a bright spot, the company’s premium bourbon Woodford Reserve exceeded 1 million nine-liter cases for the first time since its creation in the 1990s. Old Forester, a bourbon brand the company has been reinvigorating with a $45 million downtown distillery, shipped more than 300,000 cases, Whiting said on the call.
The bourbons are dwarfed by Jack Daniel’s, which sold 13 million cases in the fiscal year, and even by the honey-flavored Jack Daniel’s variety (1.9 million cases).
