After losing $12 billion, Target faces demands for documents in a possible prelude to a shareholder lawsuit

American Thinker ^ | 06/07/2023 | Monica Showalter

[Spktyr]

Making a stupid but legal decision is not valid grounds for a lawsuit of that nature, though. All the board has to do is demonstrate that their actions were taken in the good faith belief that it was in the corporation’s best interest and that no deliberately false statements or fraud was committed and the lawsuit goes away.

[RoosterRedux]

Fiduciary responsibility is about more than mere legality...though a violation of it might certainly be illegal.

This Bud Light matter might be a viable case if it could be established that AB-InBev's actions were a violation of fiduciary responsibility by putting management's political agenda ahead of the interests of the shareholders and in doing so created a significant loss in share value...particularly if it can be established that the board was being pressured by certain institutional investors (like BlackRock) to do so.

Of course, from a practical POV, the judge hearing his matter would be a problem if he were politically biased toward the Left...

[RoosterRedux]

FYI:

Elon Musk predicts class-action lawsuits against Target after company loses $15 billion

[Spktyr]

A counter from the defense would be to present studies showing that they believed that such a course of behavior would increase sales and had some research to indicate that. If so, such a move could be justified as being in the best interest of the shareholders/corporation. Additionally, that’s the thing about ESG loans - they could say that this was being required to keep the free money they were being given, which would also have been in the corporation’s best interests.

[Spktyr]

The Target debacle is different, though. “We carry a product designed by someone who is anathema to our customer base and publicly espouses illegal conduct” isn’t quite the same as “We thought we could market to the LGBTQOMGWTFBBQ segment.”

[RoosterRedux]

A counter from the defense would be to present studies showing that they believed that such a course of behavior would increase sales and had some research to indicate that.

Do you think an unbiased study would show that pushing Dylan Mulvaney's face on the can would actually increase total Bud Light sales?

[RoosterRedux]

Yes. Very true (if I understand your point correctly).

The Target case would be weaker than a Bud Light case. Target is already known as a gay-friendly retailer (and has been for many years).

[Spktyr]

I think they could have a study that shows that marketing to LGBTQOMGWTFBBQ people using partnerships with YouTube influencers could result in increased sales.

[RoosterRedux]

I would think that might be true for some products. But not if your existing customer base is the typical Bud Light drinker.

Such action by Bud Light and AB-InBev looks like a case of corporate/marketing insanity.

The action of Alissa Heinerscheid is inexplicable at best.

In a sane world, this case would be taught in future marketing courses as something NOT TO DO.

[Spktyr]

Other way around - the Target case is actually stronger than the Bud Light case.

[RoosterRedux]

We’ll have to agree to disagree.