After caving to pressure and ditching its DEI initiatives, the agriculture chain is facing pressure from another segment of its customer base.
For more than six years, Joe Montello worked for Tractor Supply Co. in Ray Brook, New York. Once the owner of 32 chickens, four ducks, and two peacocks — along with some dogs and cats — Montello was a customer at the big box farm supply store long before he became general manager. He liked the job, and was heartened in 2021 when the company formally introduced Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programming for employees, including a training module. As a gay man, Montello said, “It was really nice to see that they were making an effort.”
But in late June, Tractor Supply did an about-face, eliminating its DEI work in response to a campaign led by conservative influencer Robby Starbuck, who urged his hundreds of thousands of followers to lodge complaints and boycott Tractor Supply. Now the company, which has more than 2,200 locations nationwide, is facing backlash from a different segment of its customer base: Queer and BIPOC farmers nationwide are speaking out and calling for a boycott.
In early June on Twitter (X), anti-trans activist Starbuck berated the company’s inclusion policies, saying “these woke priorities don’t align with our state or @TractorSupply’s customer base.” Weeks later, in an email to staff and a June 27 press release, the company announced it would eliminate all DEI roles and goals; no longer sponsor Pride or voting-related events; cease to report data to the Human Rights Campaign; and withdraw its carbon emissions goals. The change was directly attributed to the complaints, and the company said it had taken “this feedback to heart” and would now “ensure our activities and giving tie directly to our business.”
Montello first caught wind of the news on TikTok, then saw a related email to staff from Hal Lawton, the company’s CEO. Montello says his manager, who knew he is gay, then called and attempted to reassure him. In practice, she told him, not much would change, and the company would still “hire people of diversity.” (Tractor Supply declined to comment for this story.)
Even though he didn’t have another job lined up, it only took Montello a couple days to decide to quit. After growing up during the AIDS crisis, then living through decades of progress for the LGBTQ community, he has watched with dismay over the last several years as political hostility toward his community has grown with renewed energy. The timing of Tractor Supply’s policy change pushed him over the edge.
“That’s why the decision really irked me,” said Montello. “Here’s a company that was being proactive in DEI, and then just turned on a dime to side with this bigoted minority.”
Montello is in good company. Ambrook Research spoke to farmers across the country who were dismayed by the decision, and say they will no longer shop at Tractor Supply. On July 2, the National Black Farmers Association called for Lawton’s resignation. By ending its DEI initiatives, the company “has shown with its broken promises that it has little respect for black farmers,” said NBFA President John Boyd, a Tractor Supply shareholder. A national coalition of farmers and farm coalitions is now launching a national campaign against Tractor Supply, calling for a boycott until Hal Lawton resigns and the DEI and carbon emissions policies are reinstated. Signatories include LGBTQ+ and BIPOC-led farms and farm coalitions and their allies in the farming community.
Tractor Supply's customer base is broad (pictured Andie Young and Joe Montello)
Tractor Supply is clearly not the first corporation to land in the crosshairs of a right-wing boycott campaign aimed at DEI initiatives or other inclusive practices. Airlines came under fire earlier this year from conservative politicians and influencers for prioritizing diversity in hiring, some of whom claimed DEI efforts were to blame for recent flight safety incidents. Last year, following a brief partnership with influencer Dylan Mulvaney, Bud Light became the target of a conservative anti-trans boycott campaign. These campaigns arrive in the context of heightened legislative attacks against transgender kids and adults in states across the country, and at a time when presidential hopefuls Donald Trump and JD Vance are hitting the campaign trail trumpeting plans to erode civil rights protections for LGBTQ communities and ban gender-affirming care.
It’s that political climate that makes the timing of Tractor Supply’s announcement particularly troubling to Andie Young, a trans farmer based in Colorado. Young said he will no longer shop at Tractor Supply. “Even if I need a fence bracket and I’m worried my cow might get out because I don’t have this one bracket, I’m going to call Premier 1 instead and wait a day or two,” said Young, referring to an Iowa-based livestock supply company.
“Right now it is so important what you say, and what you take a stand for, because there’s a lot on the line,” Young added.
Other farmers are especially concerned about the company’s choice to abruptly stop reporting carbon emissions. Jack Shultz, a queer and trans farmer who co-owns Untraditional Fruits, an Olympia, Washington-based urban microfarm, said Tractor Supply’s decision betrays a lack of understanding of its customer base.
“Farmers are extremely concerned about greenhouse gases and the impact of climate change on crop yields, water usage, et cetera,” said Shultz. Tractor Supply “clearly doesn’t understand the true challenges that farms face, and worse still, are actively exacerbating those challenges for farmers by reneging on carbon emissions goals.”
Kia-Beth Bennett, a queer farm owner in upstate New York who runs a regenerative agriculture collective, is another Tractor Supply customer who will be shopping elsewhere. Bennett said growing up on a farm, they regularly relied on Tractor Supply because they had specific agricultural products at the ready that might not always be in stock elsewhere. But in their county, they say the farmers they work with are lucky to have plenty of options. Ultimately, the company’s decision is a welcome incentive to support smaller businesses. “It’s sad that Tractor Supply did this, but it’s not surprising,” said Bennett. “What I gained was a little shove to be a little more locally oriented. To have that nudge to say just go to Ryan’s Hardware Store and buy locally, and really commit to that, meant that I had to flip my worldview a little bit.”
“Right now it is so important what you say, and what you take a stand for, because there’s a lot on the line.”
Of course, while some farmers are making plans to shop elsewhere, others are pleased to see Tractor Supply step away from DEI work. On a Tractor Supply subreddit, some users expressed relief. “Hal [Lawton]‘s insistence on hiring based on race and sexual preferences is what caused this controversy,” wrote one commenter on a thread about Montello leaving his job. “His backtrack was good news for those working and shopping at TSC … DEI is devisive [sic] and patronizing.” In another thread, a user wrote “I want to know that you sell quality products & are kind to your employees. Please leave politics out of it!”
Capitulating to the demands of one segment of their customer base will inevitably win back some shoppers, even as the company loses others. Other Reddit users made clear that they intended to end their boycott: “Now I can finally go back to shopping there,” wrote one.
Starbuck, meanwhile, has turned his attention to John Deere’s DEI policies. The beleaguered company, which recently announced another round of layoffs and the hiring of its first Chief Tractor Officer, attracted his ire for sponsoring a Pride event and encouraging employees to use their preferred pronouns. Just a week after Starbuck attacked the company in a video on X, John Deere issued a press release seemingly distancing itself from DEI policies.
Amid “ongoing conversations,” the release stated that John Deere would “no longer participate in or support external social or cultural awareness parades, festivals, or events”; conduct an audit of all training materials and policies “to ensure the absence of socially motivated messages”; and reaffirmed that “the existence of diversity quotas and pronoun identification have never been and are not company policy.” The company also added that it would “continue to track and advance the diversity of our organization.”
On one farming message board, a user lamented that finding an ag company without DEI initiatives would be harder than identifying the ones that do. “A list of major farm equipment manufacturers that are on the non-woke list would be much shorter than the ones on the woke list,” they wrote.
In his own town of Saranac Lake, meanwhile, Montello has been pleasantly surprised by an outpouring of support from former Tractor Supply customers, friends, and community members, many of whom vow to stop shopping there. As soon as word of him quitting got out, messages started pouring in on Facebook, including a job offer in construction. Recently, while taking a hike, he ran into a regular customer: “They stopped me and said, ‘Hey I want you to know I’m proud of what you did, and I will no longer be shopping at Tractor Supply.‘”
