Starbucks South Africa comes out in support of Pride

Starbucks South Africa is once again showing its support for the LGBTQ community ahead of Pride month in Gauteng.

The company said it is committed to supporting all Pride initiatives in various cities worldwide, including in South Africa. For the first time, this year, it will be backing Pretoria Pride on Saturday 6 October.

“To show our support, through the month of October we will have window posters in all our stores with a select Pretoria store getting a burst of colour across the store front,” said Leigh Roux, Starbucks South Africa Marketing Manager.

“We will also be printing stickers and vouchers in our support of Pride and will be using these to help build excitement with our customers and partners,” she told Mambaonline.

“We also encourage all of our in-store partners to embrace their own diversity and join in at the Pretoria Pride event.” Like it did last year, the company will be doing a similar activation with stickers and cups for Johannesburg Pride on 27 October at its store in Melrose Arch,

“Starbucks has a long history of supporting initiatives that celebrate diversity and Pride is one of them,” said Roux. “We advocate human rights and this includes the right to freedom of expression and sexual preference and we are proud to let everyone know that we are supporters.”

Unlike in other countries, few companies in South Africa – especially locally based corporates – publicly express their support for the LGBTQ community or Pride events.

Some are even known to have provided funding for Pride events but do not want this to be known to the public out of fear of offending conservative customers in South Africa and the wider region.

Pretoria Pride organiser Bruce Walker welcomed the support from the international coffeehouse chain for Pride. “I think that with an international brand like Starbucks, it shows companies that the LGBTQ market is not harmful to their brand in South Africa, but is an asset.”