It’s been almost five years since Aurora James made the Instagram post that changed everything.
In the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd in 2020, and the conversation around race in America that followed, the fashion designer went on social media and asked major retailers like Whole Foods to commit to buying 15% of their products from Black-owned businesses.
The campaign was wildly successful, and turned into The Fifteen Percent Pledge, a non-profit organization started by James to create a more equitable economic future. Sephora became the first major corporation to commit to the pledge in June of 2020. To date, the organization says it has redirected almost $14 billion in revenue to Black-owned companies, which are often small businesses, through corporate partnerships. Currently, the organization says it has 29 active partners, including Nordstrom, Yelp, and Ulta.
But we’re living in a different world now. A Supreme Court decision to end affirmative action in 2023 kicked off a cultural DEI backlash, and the first few weeks of President Trump’s second term included executive orders specifically targeting DEI programs in government and the private sector. Many major companies have changed their programs and language around diversity and inclusion, either making public statements about cancelling initiatives, or taking a quieter approach by scrubbing DEI language from their annual reports.
Despite the DEI rollback at the corporate level, James says none of companies that have joined the Fifteen Percent Pledge have bowed out this year. And a survey conducted by the organization, in partnership with the Global Strategy Group, found that 61% of registered voters said it was important to them that the companies they purchase from actively support DEI initiatives. Approximately 40% said that if a company they buy from regularly rolled back or eliminated DEI commitments, they would either stop buying from them entirely or would buy from them less frequently.
James spoke with Fortune about the biggest misconceptions regarding DEI, the power of consumer boycotts, and how her organization is facing the DEI backlash.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
What do you think is the biggest misconception about DEI?
That DEI just gives people jobs or opportunities based on their gender or the color of their skin without any credentials at all. And that’s really not what it’s about. It’s about creating a diverse meritocracy. Let’s actually make sure that we’re casting an incredibly wide net and including people that normally don’t have access to shoot their shot.
What is your take on the boycotts happening right now? There’s a “corporate fast” among Black shoppers in particular.
I think that consumers definitely shape corporate priorities with their spending habits. I personally believe that boycotts are really successful, but also I just know that there’s this huge swath of consumers that work really, really, really hard for every single dollar that they earn, and they just do not want to spend it somewhere that is not in alignment with their values. There’s so many places to spend money, so why would you want to spend it somewhere that doesn’t feel good to you? Or it doesn’t feel comfortable to be in the store, because you know that their C-suite or that their board don’t really value you as a human? I absolutely think that we can’t ask people in this economy, when they work so hard for their money, to shop anywhere that isn’t in alignment with their values.
How does it feel to see companies like Target that were previously so vocal about their support for DEI make these sweeping changes?
There’s other people who rolled it back, for sure, but Target is the big one. The first idea that I had for The Fifteen Percent Pledge was because I was on the phone with someone talking about Target. They’re based in this city where George Floyd was murdered [Minneapolis]. The pledge has had a fairly public ongoing discourse with them, because they always refused to take the pledge. And I think that’s because [DEI] was largely optic [for the company].
[Target declined to comment for this story.]
How do you think businesses that roll back their DEI initiatives will fare in the long run?
If we look ahead a decade, right, we’re going to see that a lot of these companies that haven’t embraced diverse thought are going to really struggle. The biggest problems need the best and most varied minds at the table to really solve them. And America, whether people want to embrace it or not, is an extremely diverse country. We know that small business is the backbone of the American economy, right? So any kind of effort to undermine diversity and inclusion is also a direct threat to small business in America, which I think is a gigantic mistake.
How is Fifteen Percent Pledge planning to move forward in this moment?
It’s just really been about doubling down and trying to support our partners.
I’m a huge supporter of small business in America. I believe that is the American dream. I believe that’s how America is strong. I believe that’s how America is great. So the idea of these giant [companies] just swallowing everything up is a disaster to me, and a disaster for everyday Americans. I have a specific lived experience as being a founder who’s a person of color, and that helps me do the work that I do at The Fifteen Percent Pledge.
