China slaps down D&G in fight over offensive videos

Bloomberg

Thousands of Dolce & Gabbana goods have been pulled from China’s biggest shopping websites after the Italian fashion house’s marketing went off the rails in a country that’s driving the industry’s growth.
Calls for a boycott against the label gained traction after a video campaign showed a
Chinese model struggling to
eat spaghetti with chopsticks — a depiction that was criticised as racist and insensitive — and incendiary messages purportedly from co-founder Stefano Gabbana’s Instagram account went viral.
It’s the latest backlash against a Western company’s marketing in China, whose consumers spent more than $100 billion on luxury purchases last year — almost a third of the global total — and are no longer willing to tolerate campaigns perceived as patronising or disrespectful. As social media gives them a megaphone, brands ranging from LVMH’s Christian Dior to Daimler AG’s Mercedes-Benz to apparel chain Gap Inc. have been tripped up.
Cross-border e-commerce site Yangmatou said that it had taken 58,000 D&G products down, saying that “the Motherland is more important than anything else.” NetEase Inc. said all D&G items have been removed from its Kaola shopping platforms.
D&G was forced to postpone a fashion show in Shanghai as celebrities said they would not attend.
A commentary on the WeChat account of China’s People’s Daily said the government issued a cancellation notice for the event and warned: “If one is not willing to understand China, eventually it will lose the China market and the benefits arising from China’s growth.”
The country’s consumers have become increasingly quick to call out brands for marketing they see as condescending, out of touch or racist. Some felt the D&G video played on Western stereotypes of Chinese tourists carrying chopsticks with them and struggling to eat Western cuisine — even if they can afford designer clothing.
Social media users slammed Dior this summer when it posted a video featuring a Hong Kong fashion blogger going to a store and posing with a new handbag.
Elsewhere in the world, the brand has a dreamier, less literal approach to marketing.
Mercedes apologised earlier this year after quoting the Dalai Lama — the Tibetan spiritual leader who’s seen as a threat by Beijing — in a China-focused Instagram post.
References to Taiwan and Tibet as nations in marketing or online material have also tripped up the likes of apparel chain Zara, hotel operator Marriott International and Delta Air Lines Inc.
Gap pulled a T-shirt featuring a map of China that left out territories claimed by Beijing.
The latest controversy erupted over an ad campaign featuring clips of a Chinese model in a red, sequined D&G dress struggling to eat Italian dishes like spaghetti and cannoli pastry with a pair of chopsticks. They featured traditional Chinese music and a suggestive voiceover from a male narrator, who asks the actress trying
to eat the cannoli: “Is it too big for you?”
On Internet giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.’s Tmall shopping portal, a search for D&G in both English and Chinese returned no results, while a check of JD.com’s site also produced no D&G items.
Alibaba and JD.com Inc. didn’t immediately respond
to requests for comment,
while Dolce & Gabbana didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the pulled items.
The closely held brand has sales of almost $1.1 billion, according to Bloomberg data.