LGBTQ+-focused publishers confronted a tougher-than-usual Satisfaction month this June, as advert {dollars} did not materialize.
Some noticed fewer new advertisers and decrease advert spend this Satisfaction month in comparison with final yr.
Execs at 4 LGBTQ+-focused publishers Digiday spoke to attributed the slowdowns and pullbacks to the present social and political local weather.
Some blamed the Trump administration’s pushback on range, fairness and inclusion applications (advert budgets spent with LGBTQ+-focused publishers usually come out of multicultural advertising commitments). Others mentioned advertisers have been extra cautious with LGBTQ+ media spending because the 2023 backlash to Bud Mild’s Satisfaction marketing campaign that includes transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney. And the present financial local weather is the cherry on high, they mentioned. Company Satisfaction sponsorships total are shrinking this yr, for these identical causes.
Advert company Burrell Communications Group is amongst these struggling to get manufacturers to commit spending with LGBTQ+ publications, and has seen multicultural budgets get shaved, in line with chief technique officer God-Is-Rivera. “I’m seeing this mad scramble of, ‘what can we do to maintain doing this?’ Or at the least, if it was 100% funded, ‘can we preserve it at 50% funded?’” she mentioned.
If a model’s values align with LGBTQ+ publishers and their viewers, it shouldn’t pull advert spend at contentious occasions like these, careworn God-Is Rivera. “Are you going to be another person each 4 years within the U.S.?… Model values should be unshakable,” she mentioned. “They should parse by means of what that appears like amongst sentiment shifts… I’m seeing this conduct that’s unsustainable.”
Whereas the end result is much less dire than the dwindling Satisfaction Month model offers for LGBTQ+ influencers, the slowdown means these publishers are grappling with much less income than they anticipated thus far this yr.
One LGBTQ+ publishing firm’s Satisfaction Month advert income is a few third lower than it was final yr, with about 30% fewer offers year-over-year, in line with its CEO, who requested to not be recognized to talk candidly. Advert income for Revry, an LGBTQ+-focused related TV streaming community, is flat this June yr over yr.
“A number of manufacturers that we had been in deep discussions with in early 2025 implied their reticence to be in an LGBTQ+ atmosphere given the political local weather — and in the end handed. One model particularly really had a Satisfaction marketing campaign, which acquired pulled on the final minute,” Mark Tevis, Revry’s evp of gross sales & partnerships, instructed Digiday in an e-mail. He declined to call names.
The nameless CEO instructed Digiday their firm’s advertisers sit in two buckets: one which spends with their publications all year long, and one other that “pops up like whack-a-mole” round occasions like Satisfaction. Advert spend from manufacturers within the first bucket has remained constant this yr, they mentioned.
However the ones within the second bucket have “declined considerably,” the CEO mentioned. Satisfaction Month is often their firm’s single-highest income month. This yr, their firm received’t hit its Q2 income aim. The writer’s advert income is 95% direct bought, and the remainder programmatic, in line with the CEO.
However their firm deliberate for this, as soon as Trump was elected, they added. They’ve needed to be extra cautious with spending this yr, chopping again on giant occasions round Satisfaction.
“We’d’ve fortunately scrambled and made them larger… with the suitable advertisers,” the CEO mentioned. “However we made a guess and we have been proper.”
These “pop up” advertisers standing on the sidelines this month are additionally a misplaced alternative, the CEO mentioned. “We would’ve been capable of increase [a Pride-related campaign] into one thing larger,” they mentioned.
Due to the present financial, political and social volatility, there’s numerous “trepidation” from advertisers, in line with Rivera, who mentioned manufacturers have to decide to the audiences they’re making an attempt to achieve, as a substitute of being “wishy-washy.”
Rivera, who joined Burrell three months in the past, is engaged on a framework for response methods when sentiments change. “To look at [advertisers] cower and be nonetheless [around Pride]… that’s disappointing. As a strategist, it’s my job and the job of others in my place to resolve for what’s greatest… We have to work on the answer. This concept of simply pulling again after which, what occurs in 2026?” Rivera mentioned.
Tag Warner, the CEO of the U.Okay.-based Homosexual Instances, mentioned in a TikTok video that the corporate misplaced eight of its 10 advertisers within the final 12 months.
Most of Revry’s advertisers should not pulling again this month, “however we’re additionally not seeing many new manufacturers signal on,” Tevis mentioned. In 2024, Revry had 23 whole advertisers round Satisfaction, with 19 new manufacturers. This yr, the corporate has 28 advertisers, with 18 new manufacturers. “We now have extra advertisers in 2025 than in 2024, so budgets have been decreased,” Tevis mentioned.
Going into 2025, Revry was forecasting year-over-year progress in June. With that now not the case, Revry is determining how one can make this up elsewhere, Tevis mentioned. Happily, most of Revry’s advertisers have purchased sponsorships that transcend Satisfaction, he added. “It’s not atypical for Revry to see greater advert income in months exterior of June,” Tevis mentioned.
A publishing exec at one other LGBTQ+ writer – who requested to talk anonymously – mentioned they have been bought by means of for the month of Satisfaction. Nevertheless, final yr their publication had large, splashy sponsorships from manufacturers round Satisfaction. This yr, their publication has bought its June stock, however not as a lot is centered round Satisfaction-related content material or occasions, they mentioned.
“Manufacturers are nonetheless promoting with us as a result of they see that LGBTQ+ is a part of progress advertising,” they mentioned. “However it’s much less loud and fewer proud.”
Even when Satisfaction will not be what it has been traditionally this yr, execs remained optimistic.
“We misplaced 15 offers [in March 2020]. All people pulled again [because of the COVID-19 pandemic]. However that This fall lit up,” the nameless CEO mentioned. “After six-to-nine months of Trump, and the tariff threats [die down], that’s a risk for that within the again half of the yr.”
