The Walt Disney Company is the biggest spender when it comes to advertising on Facebook in the first half of 2020, and now they’ve made the decision to spend advertising for Disney+ and Hulu on the social media giant.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Disney decided to scale back on advertising on Facebook amid the #StopHateForProfit campaign. Disney joins major companies in the halt including Unilever, Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Target, Starbucks, Verizon and Acura. The initiative is led by groups including the NAACP and the Anti-Defamation League.
In the first six months of 2020, Disney spent well over $210 million on Facebook ads on Disney+ alone in the United States. The company also dropped Instagram advertising for the Disney-owned Hulu. The company is reportedly “rexamining their advertising on Facebook,” with ABC, Freeform, and Disney Channel advertising all vanished from the site.
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A representative for Facebook didn’t directly comment on Disney’s decision to pull ads, but had this to say:
“We invest billions of dollars each year to keep our community safe and continuously work with outside experts to review and update our policies. We know we have more work to do, and we’ll continue to work with civil rights groups, GARM [the Global Alliance for Responsible Media coalition], and other experts to develop even more tools, technology and policies to continue this fight.”
Later this year, Disney+ will release two feature films, The One and Only Ivan and Magic Camp, a second season of the Star Wars spinoff The Mandalorian will debut, as well as the highly-anticipated Marvel Studios series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and WandaVision. If the pandemic continues until that point Disney would be likely to resume some ad spending, but not anywhere near the $210 million the company was spending in the first six month of this year.
Source: Walt Street Journal
