Posted on 03/12/2002 12:27:20 PM PST by pabianice
For Immediate Release
March 12, 2002
Contacts: Julie Bernstein
Kristin Becker
(202) 822-6070
H&R Block Severs Ties with National Rifle Association
Washington, D.C.-In a stunning defeat for the gun lobby, H&R Block, the nation's largest tax preparation firm, today severed a controversial marketing agreement it had entered into with the National Rifle Association (NRA). H&R Block's withdrawal from the program came as a result of widespread protests spearheaded by the Alliance for Justice's Gun Industry Watch, and supported by the Million Mom March united with the Brady Campaign and the Mid-Atlantic Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence.
"Let this send a loud message to other corporate partners of the NRA," said Alliance for Justice President Nan Aron. "If you support the NRA, we will work to make sure that your employees, customers, and all of your stakeholders know that you support an extremist gun lobby that is out of step with mainstream America."
"The termination of this agreement is a tremendous victory for everyone who was outraged that a reputable business like H&R Block would support an extremist organization like the NRA," said Michael D. Barnes, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence united with the Million Mom March. "Marketing your products to a specific group of people is an accepted business practice, but H&R Block crossed the line when it agreed to pay royalties to the NRA."
"Corporations doing business with the NRA should be very concerned by the large efforts of hundreds of gun safety activists that came out in defiance of H&R Block's agreement with the NRA," said Bryan Miller of the Mid-Atlantic Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence.
H&R Block had entered into an agreement with a marketing company called Memberdrive to market its products and services to NRA members. However, the agreement also provided for "royalties" paid by H&R Block, through Memberdrive, to the NRA. According an H&R Block advertisement that ran in the March issue of America's First Freedom, the NRA's magazine, H&R Block "will make a contribution to the NRA for every Member who becomes a new customer." Memberdrive's Senior Vice President of Marketing is Susan LaPierre, wife of NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre.
Gun Industry Watch, a student network, first exposed the agreement in late February, staging a protest outside of an H&R Block outlet in Washington, DC, and planning dozens more. Over the past two weeks, thousands of activists including those from the Million Mom March and the Brady Campaign joined with Gun Industry Watch and called, faxed and e-mailed H&R Block to express their objections to this agreement and to educate the company on the extremist positions that the NRA has taken in the past. With Gun Industry Watch recruiting students, Million Mom March recruiting its members and support from the Mid-Atlantic Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence, protests of H&R Block offices in more than 50 cities had been planned for mid-March. These protests have now been called off.
"This victory shows the power of the gun control movement's grassroots," said Aron. "When you engage students and moms together, it's a potent combination."
"H&R Block now understands that, by areeing to this royalty scheme, it was furthering the reckless political agenda of the NRA's leadership," said Mr. Barnes. "Congratulations to Gun Industry Watch and to all of our Million Mom March activists and members for making their voices heard."
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Your satisfaction is our number one priority at H&R Block. To make sure we satisfy all your financial needs, we'd like you to share your questions and suggestions with us. That's why we created a simple form to help you do just that.
How about an email address of marketing or something?
L
Apparently H&R Block has failed to realize that the student hippies it just bowed to are rather unlikely to ever use its tax preparation services. I, on the other hand, will be depriving H&R of substantial sums in future years by going to other tax and financial consultants. They need to do the math.
The gun-grabbers and other left-wing groups are showing more and more facist tendencies by the day.
How about an email address of marketing or something?
No. It's not "required info," those are just "required fields." You just have to be creative enough to enter some info into the "required fields!!!"
There was a classic car-grabber hotline initiated by the Texas Natural Resources Commission to turn in "polluting" cars' license numbers so the TNRCC could send harassing letters to the anti-environment owners. Creative folks drove thru the TNRCC parking lot, wrote down all the license #'s in Directors and VIP parking spaces, and turned them all in! Guess what? That program became very low profile.
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