Lululemon Stops Funding Pro-Looting Activists
How showing up and asking questions can make a difference.
A year ago, we attended Lululemon’s 2023 annual meeting to ask them about their shoplifting problem. At the time, Lululemon was facing serious criticism over an incident of firing two employees for the crime of yelling at masked shoplifters and chasing them out of a Georgia store. The company, bizarrely, fired their employees in keeping with their ‘zero-tolerance’ policy regarding engaging with shoplifters. As we noted in a World article at the time, CEO Calvin McDonald’s claim that the stolen goods were ‘just merchandise’ fell flat: “It’s not his property, it’s the property of the shareholders. He is supposed to be a steward of that property on their behalf.”
At that 2023 meeting, we asked the CEO point-blank about the disconnect between Lululemon’s shoplifting problem and its political support for pro-looting organizations like BLM. “What precisely is the company’s policy on looting, shoplifting and other forms of stealing property which belongs to the shareholders?” we asked. “According to the Claremont Institute, you have pledged a substantial amount of shareholder resources to the BLM Foundation and related groups. Given the association of some of these groups with encouragement of not just protest but looting, can you clarify exactly what you, the CEO, think about acts of larceny of company property?”
His response? “We have longstanding relationships, working with both local and federal law enforcements, to protect to enforce [sic]. We take proactive measures and have continued to in many locations, when we feel the need to do so. Again, we enforce a policy in which we don't put the lives or safety of our employees at risk.”
As you can probably tell, that’s a cop out answer. So we doubled down on the question post-meeting. “The moderator misquoted my question about how [stealing/looting] relates to pledges of support to BLM,” Jerry wrote in an email. “This, and the current media firestorm over the firing of those employees, together create a real sense of being soft on the looting question. Question: the company made a pledge to BLM, did it actually go on and make the contribution?”
We never got an answer.
Fast-forward a year, and Lululemon’s shoplifting woes have only gotten worse, from more robberies to coordinated efforts from organized crime groups. McDonald may well be right that the company has a longstanding relationship with law enforcement—but a growing part of that relationship seems to be spent recovering stolen Lululemon merchandise. In the lead-up to this year’s annual meeting, here’s a sampling of how it’s going for the apparel company:
Women stole $338K of Lululemon merch in thefts from Bellingham to L.A., charges say
4 women accused of stealing over $10,000 in items from Lululemon in Montgomery County
Two men charged in $3,000 retail theft from Lululemon in Upper Dublin, police say - Wiss Now (this one was literally last month)
That’s a major problem. And Lululemon has historically been happy to pledge money to organizations that are happy to prioritize social & racial activism over law and order, from Black Lives Matter to Reclaim the Block (an organization in favor of defunding the police). According to the Claremont Institute’s BLM funding database, Lululemon donated $300,000 to such causes. At some point, if you donate enough money to organizations that oppose law and order, that has ramifications.
This year, we attended Lululemon’s annual meeting again. “Why is Lululemon donating to pro-looting organizations like Black Lives Matter and pro-police defunding organizations like Reclaim the Block?” we asked. “Isn’t it in the interest of shareholders to defend law and order, particularly in regards to merchandise?”
This time, we got an actual answer. “We are not currently making donations to these orgs.”
As I wrote on X at the time, this is an optimistic sign. If Lululemon’s backing away from previous support for radically anti-police and pro-looting organizations, it could be a sign that the company’s feeling the heat on this issue. We’ll stay on this issue.
We’re not big on grabbing credit for things, but for the past two years we are the only ones who interacted with the CEO on this question, so it is likely that we had a role in changing a foolish policy which should never have been followed in the first place. But when we do something, you did something, because your shares give us a voice at these meetings.
By allowing us to represent you in this arena, we can continue to keep up the pressure to guide Lululemon, and other organizations that buy into funding social radicalism, toward a politically neutral future. And, for shareholders’ sake, hopefully a future with fewer five-figure merchandise thefts in it.
One more thing: We think this is a perfect company for a shareholder resolution about the incongruity between being a retailer and funding pro-looting ideology, and a major proxy advisory service has suggested that they would likely support us, which would be a major breakthrough.
