A conservative group has launched a new alert system that helps grocery shoppers spot products peddled by corporate behemoths that have a hand in the advancement of the left's woke agenda.

While those championing the service suggest it will "help consumers make better-informed decisions," leftists claim this anti-ESG technology is regressive.

Every purchase a battle won or lost

According to the New York Times, consumer rights activist Fredrick J. Schlink co-founded the Consumer's Club with Stuart Chase with the aim of protecting the consumer "by publicizing defective and unsafe products." They incorporated this club as the nonprofit Consumers' Research Inc. in 1931, making it America's first independent organization to test consumer products and report on them by brand name.

When Schlink stood firm against the demands of suspected communist labor unions in the mid-30s, strikers left Consumers' Research and founded the competing Consumers Union, which published Consumer Reports.

Despite this schism, the original organization persisted.

Will Hild, who previously worked with the Federalist Society and other conservative organizations, became the executive director of Consumers' Research in 2020, then championed the launch of the Consumers First Initiative the following year, seeking to put "corporations on notice that they need to start serving their customers, not woke politicians."

Consumers' Research has since sought to fight environmental, social, and governance initiatives, noting that ESG is wielded by political activists and their ideological allies in the business community to "drive a progressive agenda ... through economic coercion and ignoring democratic processes."

The Washington Post reported in January, "Consumers’ Research has morphed into aself-styled watchdog of liberal causes. It has singled out ESG, which it argues harms consumers, reduces investment returns and contributes to inflation."

Its budget reportedly grew tenfold to over $8 million in 2021, and its 2022 budget was likely $2 million higher.

Leonard A. Leo, the Federalist Society’s co-chairman, told the Post, "Consumers’ Research and its leader Will Hild are executing the most impactful pushback I know against ESG and other aspects of woke corporate culture. ... It’s time that businesses that are out of step with the sentiments of most Americans pay a price for their standing up for woke special interests instead of consumers."

Woke alerts

Axios reported that as of Friday, Consumers' Research is offering "Woke Alert": a free text service that notifies grocery shoppers which brands are linked to the left's cultural, economic, and social agendas.

The sign-up page says, "Many corporations are putting progressive activists and their dangerous agendas ahead of customers. They'll only succeed if we look the other way."

Subscribers to the service are alerted when an organization or brand ceases to merely sell a product and instead begins peddling a radical ideology or participating in wokery.

For instance, subscribers would have recently received a woke alert about Jack Daniel's. The alert indicated that the recent Jack Daniel's "Small Town, Big Pride" advertising campaign featured drag queens, one of whom stressed “drag culture — which is all about … inviting others to accept you as you are.”

Shoppers with little time on their hands are spared the legwork and provided supporting evidence for the alerts; in this case, a Newsweek article detailing the Jack Daniel's boycott over claims the company has "gone woke."

Already, there have been woke alerts about Anheuser-Busch, BlackRock, Silicon Valley Bank, the American Women's History Museum, Apple, Puffin Books, the National Football League, and others.

According to Axios, the organization is kicking off a six-figure digital ad campaign this week to promote "Woke Alert."

Leftists already upset

Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), touted as Congress' first openly gay representative, told Axios, "The right wing is hell-bent on moving our country backwards, and this new text service is laughable."

Anna Bahr, a political consultant with Left Flank Strategies, said, "I hate to break it to the radical right, but people in this country are a lot more concerned about paying for an eighty-dollar tank of gas than the color of their Budweiser bottle."

In response to Bahr's claim, the State Financial Officers Foundation noted, "Americans are equally concerned about the #ESGscam that's causing $80 tanks of gas."

\u201cSign-up for Woke Alerts today at:\n\nhttps://t.co/UPRoU5PpgA\u201d

— Consumers' Research (@Consumers' Research) 1681474629

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!