Do Black Lives Still Matter? - First Season

George Floyd -

his tragic death shocked the world.

Black lives matter!

Black lives matter! Black lives matter!

What we are fighting for is to stop institutional racism.

When he was killed, the whole world and their gran made promises

that life would get better for black people.

But did they mean it?

My name is Sas Killa, the Godson of Grime.

I'm a rapper from south-east London. And one year on, I want to know,

after the death of George Floyd, has anything changed?

In this episode, we're going to be closely looking at brands,

because those guys, they made some big promises in the summer.

But was it for real?

The biggest reason I decided, "OK, it's definitely time to leave,"

was after the George Floyd incident.

How many black employees did you have in your organisation?

That's all we wanted to know.

Or was the death of this black man

just one big marketing opportunity?

It's very easy for brands to post a tweet,

post a black square, make a one-time donation.

But what we need is a systemic change.

As man's about to find out,

when it comes to issues of race,

there ain't no simple answers.

You can't just project-manage out a bit of trauma in two quarters

and then it's all job done.

You feel like a trend.

Black creators are not a trend.

As soon as brands started posting, many consumers were suspicious.

I saw a lot of brands on social media speak out

about how they're standing in solidarity with

the Black Lives Matter movement.

This was a massive thing,

because brands usually are very quiet on these topics.

Benefit, Sleek, Rimmel, Maybelline.

Pretty Little Thing and Boohoo and Missguided.

When it comes to clothing, Topshop, River Island had stuff out.

But did these brands mean it?

A number of consumers decided to challenge them directly

on social media.

Behind all the posts, what exactly were they doing?

It felt very much like a little team of us.

We were all coming at the brands.

We all wanted answers.

I'd comment on every one.

No matter what came up on my timeline,

it just...I had to comment. It had to be addressed.

I DM'd a lot of brands

that I was interested in shopping with

and asked them what their demographics looked like,

because I wanted to know where my money was going

and if they truly stood with us.

How many black employees did you have in your organisation?

That's all we wanted to know

so that we can actually hold you accountable.

You're not just putting up a post.

You're showing us what part you have actually played in racism.

Yo, when man saw all of these companies

and organisations tweeting, Instagramming,

showing all of this allegiance towards the cause, it was insane.

You would have thought racism never previously existed,

as though it just dropped on our doorstep.

But ask any black donny on the roads,

they collectively will tell you one thing.

This is the life we've all been living

since the day we were born.

This ain't nothing new.

As this new-school commitment to diversity began to take hold,

everyone felt the effects, and more so than ever in the world

of social media influencers.

Hey! So I get asked a lot how I do my slicked-back bun.

So I thought I'd just show you what products I normally use.

Charlotte Williams owns an agency specialising in promoting

diverse influencers to brands and agencies.

Hello, Charlotte Williams!

So we're here. After we have the incident of George Floyd,

the tragedy that happened,

what was that moment like for your company?

Within the first five days of George Floyd's death,

we saw an increase of traffic to our website and it was by, like, 350%.

And there... Whoa! Yeah.

A lot of influencers grew dramatically.

I am one of them. I grew overnight from 8,000 followers

to 30,000 followers in the space of two days.

Those months from May to July were absolutely chaotic

in the sense that our general email inbox was inundated with requests.

And it was just every day a new message, a new request.

That coming up as a marketing trend, it almost... It blows my mind.

A guy walks into an office and maybe, I don't know,

he's at a big brand or something, and he's like, "Hey,

"that black thing - it's popular right now.

"Let's get a couple models, let's whip up a couple events,"

and... This is the issue. This is insanity!

The death of George Floyd happened and everything got

turned upside down and people woke up to the idea of diversity

and what it actually meant. So it was very exciting to see

that, you know, we were able to be found because of that.

But also, bittersweet in the sense that someone had to die.

For the influencers, it was boom time.

One agreed to meet me.

Gal like Karina's been an influencer for six years,

and it's fair to say, before George Floyd,

she had struggled to get noticed.

So what was the scene like for you as an influencer

pre-George Floyd?

It was a lot quieter.

Yeah, I felt like I was pitching a lot.

You know, you introduce yourself, what you do, you know,

how many followers, or what your audience is like

and what they like and how you...

..what you can do for the brand, basically.

And that was usually met with...

I'd either get aired, like, ignored... Ignored.

..or I would get an email back saying,

"We're not currently working with influencers,"

or I would get an email saying that we'd love to work with you,

but we don't have budget for this.

So, "exposure". I was met with a lot of those.

That was kind of the consistent theme before June.

Then June happened

and my followers went from 16K to 31 in four days,

and the same brands that had kind of sent me those emails or ignored me,

they were suddenly all in my email inbox

saying how they'd love to work with me,

how they'd like to add me onto the PR list,

how they'd like to include me in a campaign.

And it just made me think, "So now you care?

"I think you'll find my unread emails in your inbox!"

Scroll up! Yeah!

SHE LAUGHS

Karina was flavour of the month,

but just like that, it all turned sour.

Not long after, I'd say probably from September, October,

I noticed a massive dip in my engagement.

Whoa.

You know, all the eyes that had come over to me,

they had stopped interacting.

And that was sad.

That was really sad and frustrating, because it's almost like...

..I wish you didn't come over if you didn't really want to be here.

You feel like a trend.

We're not a trend.

Black creators are not a trend.

When it quietened down, it just hurt,

because I tried to give people the chance.

I gave companies a chance, and they let me down.

It was so hypocritical.

I'd much rather you keep your mouth closed

than pretend that you care.

Oh, you have this...

Or you're "woke", when really and truly, you're just Instagram woke.

I definitely do stand by everything that I said at that time.

And funny enough, the brand that I commented underneath

didn't even respond and they didn't share their reports.

So it just shows that they actually was full of chat.

Companies that don't prioritise this work

will feel the effects in their pockets.

People are buying products and going to brands

that they feel aligned to.

Any of the brands in the summer of last year

that haven't fulfilled those pledges,

that haven't held themselves to account, will lose consumers

that would have bought their products otherwise,

because this is too important.

People are moving with their pockets now

and will continue to do so

as we become more and more aware of the importance of this work

to everybody, not just those that it directly affects.

By the autumn of 2020,

representation on social media was back to normal.

Data captured by analysts

IQ Insights backs this up.

They looked at brand social media

images to measure skin tone.

During the BLM protests,

the number of posts featuring

darker-skinned models

doubled to 24%.

But by October,

it had gone back down.

Since then, the data has shown

a slight improvement.

But will the trend continue?

The jury's still out.

More diversity on the surface

through stylish and attractive advertising is one thing.

But what's it like inside these companies?

For the rush!

Asos is one of Britain's biggest fashion retailers.

From the outside, the company presents

a diverse image in their glossy and multicultural-inspired marketing.

Cos I'm the man. Really?

Like many youth-orientated brands,

they were vocal following the surge of the Black Lives Matter movement,

releasing a series of eye-catching promises.

On the surface, they look good.

Plans to set up a diversity and inclusion team and creating

clear goals for equal opportunities for the black community.