Advertising - who would you be unhappy about

[JustineMumsnet]

Hello, hello,
We wondered if you would mind giving us your two penneth on which companies are off limits as far as advertising is concerned. Ruling out obvious candidates like arms dealers and the BNP is there a concensus about anyone else? Would for example MacDonalds sponsoring the Food boards make people cross or would it be a case of why not let them spend some of their enormous mountain of profits keeping mumsnet afloat? Who's aloud and who isn't bascially... (thanks in advance .

personally I think it is very courteous of mumsnet to ask us

I do too enid, they absolutely don't have to, I agree. But they are very courteous.

take the money, what does it matter if McDs sponsors it for e.g., it's adults not children who look at MN.

I go straight to Talk anyway and don't really read anything else. But, ahem, of course if the ad people are reading this, I am easily swayed by everything I read and can't move for B&Q and Argos items......

I would have no problem with McDonalds. It would give me a certain satisfaction to see them sponsoring something that slags them off so regularly. Nestle is a definite no I think (even though I don't actively support the boycott). As are dubious health things.

Arms dealers I have no problem with though.

Humzingers are fine I think! They are just fruit aren't they? Haven't bought them but think so.

but agree that baby pasta producers wouldn't really be on

i agree. and it is much easier to sit around on virtual sofas sniggering and sniping than it is to give some feedback to justine.

I wouldn't be keen on anti-abortion organisations, personally.

Agree with Twiglett. Take the money from anyone who'll pay the going rate. We're all grown ups, we can ignore marketing messages from companies we're not interested in buying from, but the site can't really afford to turn away valuable funds. In fact, the more unethical the better - let's exploit them to keep our site going. Just charge them more.

Have to agree with Twiglett on this. I may have a different view if it was my kids using the site. But they don't.

Hmmm, you all look a bit squashed on that sofa

wow this moves fast, i was agreeing with enid that it is courteous of justine and the mumsnet team to ask our opinions.

It might not get very good publicity in the posh papers though ("Mumsnet with food boards sponsored by Macdonalds"
)

ah, but kids look over our shoulders apparently - hence the no swearing policy

as I'm only here for the chat and don't take much notice of the ads - I wouldn't be bothered who advertised (I'm sure the team wouldn't use anyone dodgy) so tend to agree with Twiglett (again)

Didn't think it was sniggering and swiping myself.

WWW it's come up in a discussion with an ad agency and we thought we ought to garner a sense of what people thought. Genuinely, we think you can argue it both ways, so we are just looking for a bit of direction.

Good idea on charging more Sponge.

Not courteous surely but good business sense?

Justine, I've worked for various organisations which had policies about which sort of companies they would or wouldn't take money from. I've ended up feeling either you have quite clear rules (which needn't necessarily rule out huge numbers of organisations!) or you don't have any at all. Otherwise you get stuck in a dreadful muddle for ages.