My answer is still yes.
BP does not own any gas stations. That may be true. But that is not a viable reason to not boycott BP gas stations. I am loking around the web and I guess that BP and its mega conglomerate spin machine is doing its job. There are a lot of people saying that boycotting BP is not a good idea. They are saying that it will do no good and that you are only hurting the local economy. I think it is just more spin. As usual, I have my own opinions about the matter and have no problem sharing them with you in a long rant.
First off. Oil continues to spill out of the ground and we have no way of stopping it. You can watch it here. There was a cap in place and lots of people thought that was it. That cap failed and wreaked more damage. Crude oil continues to rush into our ocean at a rate of unheard of proportions. While we all sat back and trusted that our politicians to handle this disaster, BP ignored offers of help from other countries, from everyone in fact. The CEO of BP said, “it is really a small spill for such a big ocean.” Months have gone by and BP is responsible for the largest ecological and economical disaster in recent history (by my accounts-we have a long way to go before we see just how bad this will get). TO me there is NO question that we should all be boycotting BP gasoline and BP stations.
Okay let’s look at the arguments by those who oppose boycotts of BP:
BP doesn’t own any gas stations. True. BP supplies to gasoline to franchise operations who sell their gasoline products and pay hefty fees every month to support the corporation and use their logo. While I agree that it is really those franchisees who are hurt the most by a boycott, they can leave the group and buy their gasoline elsewhere. Yes, they will lose money. Yes, they are being hurt. Yes, they will have to spend a load of cash to change over to a new supplier, and get rid of the BP logo. Yes, it means new signs, new stationery, new supplier, new credit accounts, new everything. Sorry, but sometimes in life you you make what turns out to be a mistake. Just because you hitched your wagon to the wrong company, does not mean I should help support you as you support the mega corporation that has created this mess. You picked the wrong company and I will not be giving you any more of my money to pass along to them. At some point you have to say, “enough is enough,” and bow out gracefully. Take your lumps and move on. I feel for you here, as I have made plenty of decisions that turned out in hindsight to be the wrong ones for my future. Being an adult means picking yourself up and moving on. That is called business, get over it. It has even been said that to boycott your local franchisee is unfair-I say to remain a part of the BP group is unfair. Because they don’t want to lose money, we are all supposed to look away and ignore that there has been oil spilling into the Gulf for months because your supplier ignored its safety obligations and spent more money greasing palms than on stopping potential safety hazards. The longer they stay married to the BP brand the more money they will lose. That is bad business and we are supposed to support bad business? Would you buy crappy food just because the restaurant is near your house? How about if you found out they bought their meat from a supplier that ignored health and safety violations and may have dangerous beef?
You are only hurting the local economy. I don’t even get this argument. This is obviously corporate spin at its best. If you continue to drive, then you continue to buy gas. Nearly all gas stations are franchises owned by a local business person, so switching from one brand to another will not hurt the local economy. It only moves the money to the hands of another business owner. Yeah the BP owner may lose money and have to lay off staff and even close. But those dollars spent on gas are being spent somewhere, and if you choose another local franchise to shop at, then your money stays here. That owner may have to hire more help and then jobs are created. We do not have a local oil supply or a local refinery that is going to suffer. So this whole argument makes no sense to me at all. Switching from Coke to Pepsi will not hurt the local economy. Switching from Great Lakes Brewery to Heineken will. That is how supporting the local economy works.
You can’t stop using BP anyway. There is some truth here. BP sells its oil to all kinds of manufacturers. That is why they delayed so long to start burning or decided to refuse help in the clean up They planned on salvaging as much crude as possible. Even if it isn’t good enough for gasoline, it might make plastic bags, lipsticks, even your detergent bottle. So you can’t really boycott BP completely. I imagine that if even manufacturers stopped buying BP petroleum, then they would sell it to a middle man who would turn around and sell it again as their own. It might even be blended in with oil from multiple suppliers, so you never know where it is coming from. All of this is true. However, brands are built. BP has spent a long time and a lot of money to build the BP brand. They have also spent a ton of money trying to salvage their brand and their reputation. A chunk of this money is coming from those of you who are supporting the local BP station who passes along their share in franchise fees to BP, as well as taking their profits in gasoline. Big oil is big business. When you stop buying BP gas, you are telling them that their brand is tarnished, and you are asking the franchisees to switch suppliers. Some already have.
Unless you are planning on going to the Gulf and volunteering to wash wildlife, there is little that you can do right now to stem the results of this disaster. One is to contact British Parliament and tell them to rein in one of their corporations. Another is to contact your congress person and tell them how fed up you are-even write the president! But the biggest thing that you can do is to stop buying BP gasoline. You have to spend your money where it matters. By boycotting BP you are helping to stop further disasters. I would bet that right now, other oil companies are double checking their oil rigs to prevent this from happening to them. If we ignore it, why wouldn’t they?
Really, the only way to stop this kind of abuse is to stop using so much fossil fuels. But don’t get me going on that….
