Groupon Pulls Ads From Trump's 'The Apprentice' Website

Daily deals site Groupon has dropped advertisements from the website for Trump's show The Apprentice after the online community began a protest petitioning the site to do so.

Groupon responded in a blog post, denying that it had sponsored Trump, and noting that it would pull ads from the website.

"Here’s the thing: Groupon has never been a sponsor of The Apprentice on TV or on the web. We invest heavily in online advertising through networks that place ads on a rolling basis, meaning that we know one will appear on NBC.com but not specifically which page," they wrote.

Groupon also explained its reasoning for pulling the ads by lumping Trump in with topics that are known to be politically divisive.

"Enough consumers have contacted us to warrant ensuring that we don’t place ads on the Apprentice homepage in the future," it wrote. "It’s the same reason we don’t run deals on guns or abortion…this isn’t a political statement, it’s avoiding intentionally upsetting a segment of our customers."

The petition, which now proclaims its success, read:

Dear @Groupon — Donald Trump’s recent racist attacks against our president are blatant and grotesque. We ask you to pull your advertising support from @ApprenticeNBC in protest and ask NBC to fire Donald Trump now. Given the recent blowup over your Super Bowl commercials, you are a company that understands better than most how the perception of disrespect and insensitivity can impact your brand. If you do not show yourself to be a company that stands for basic civility and stands against hateful and hurtful rhetoric, I will no longer use your daily deal service.

A Groupon rep proceeded to tweet heatedly at Think Progress, saying "Make it clear that we NEVER sponsored the Apprentice, not that we’re “stopping.” I demand accountability on your end, too" and "You have a responsibility to inform people thoroughly on what they’re protesting, and you haven’t done that."

Despite the pull, Adweek found that Groupon is still running a deal on its Philadelphia and North Jersey sites offering discounts at Trump’s casino in Atlantic City, meaning the site is still sending money his way.

Read on for Groupon's full statement:

You know when you hear some juicy gossip about Sarah dating Peter, and it spreads around the office, and suddenly Sarah’s secretly married to Peter who’s cheating on his taxes so that he can pay for magician school? That happened to us today.

Someone online began a petition to boycott Groupon because they believed we were a sponsor of the Apprentice, a show that is in the middle of some political criticism at the moment.

Then, just like that, it was announced we were pulling our sponsorship and boycotting the Apprentice and NBC. Pulling a fake sponsorship that didn’t exist….

Here’s the thing: Groupon has never been a sponsor of The Apprentice on TV or on the web. We invest heavily in online advertising through networks that place ads on a rolling basis, meaning that we know one will appear on NBC.com but not specifically which page. We know that some advertising appeared on the Apprentice home page a few weeks ago.

Enough consumers have contacted us to warrant ensuring that we don’t place ads on the Apprentice homepage in the future. It’s the same reason we don’t run deals on guns or abortion…this isn’t a political statement, it’s avoiding intentionally upsetting a segment of our customers.

Thanks for allowing us to clear this up. Maybe we can make this blog post go viral, too.

Comments

[legspin]

11:58 PM on 05/03/2011

The odds of Trump running a clean Presidential Race are about the same as Dan Quayle being able to spell PHLEBITIS

[5pliff5tar]

01:05 AM on 05/03/2011

so much fail

[Imzadi]

06:52 PM on 05/02/2011

Wow - an article where you can post freely - defintely a vanishing breed.

{clearing throat}

I have friends who were offering their business' services on Groupon and purportedly got shafted. I will not use them.

[cbear13]

03:00 PM on 05/02/2011

I'm glad they got all huffy (pun intended) about not intentionally supporting the Donald. Not certain how posting Groupons in North Jersey and Philly for the Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino can be called not supporting him though. I guess if you stop one bad behavior it counts as stopping all in the Groupon book.

[conservicide]

02:26 AM on 05/02/2011

Yep, trump is a racist all right

[tuckjessica]

01:36 AM on 05/02/2011

Guess I'm leaving Groupon. Groupon didn't take into account those who either didn't care that they were on Trump's site, or actually support The Apprentice and what Trump is doing (like me). I can't respect a company that will allow itself to be bullied by a few people, so I won't support them financially either I guess.

[onionboy]

05:08 PM on 05/02/2011

So, you want to do exactly what the people you call "bullies" said they would do.

[Pembrokelib]

07:07 PM on 05/01/2011

I signed the petition and am happy that Trump was dumped. I would think more of Groupon if they had dumped him because he is an obnoxious bigot and not just because they didn't want to upset their customers. Pragmatic but not laudable.

[John Toth]

01:04 PM on 05/01/2011

Trump has turned out to be one of the dumbest people on the planet, soon to be brought down by his own ego. Instead of enjoying his fame and fortune, he decided to let people see what type of person he really is ... a bully, racist, angry white man. His name will be trash within 6 months. His show will be gone. His endorsements will mean nothing, and we may even find out about a few questionable dealings. Nice work, Trump.

[WilmaJune]

01:04 PM on 05/01/2011

Groupon is in a limited number of cities. The closest to me is 1 1/2 hour drive. This story is an attempt on their part to gain recognition. Since everyone likes to complain about Trump, they succeeded. Who knows if the story, according to Groupon, actually occurred.

[edgeninja]

05:03 AM on 05/01/2011

It would not surprise me if this ended up being the last season of "The Apprentice". NBC's stupid, but I think even they are feeling continuously uneasy being associated with a man who panders to racists.

[ritgar]

06:06 PM on 05/02/2011

Even if they do dump him, how much do you want to bet he doesn't land on FOX?

[captainindustry]

03:14 AM on 05/01/2011

If you go down the boycott road, The Rachel Maddow Show will be the next casualty of that war.

Write Rachel an email and tell her that you are sorry, but you've decided to start a trend in boycotting shows and websites, because you are drunk with power.

[LonosCurse]

01:39 PM on 05/01/2011

Yes because we all too stupid to distinguish between an investigative journalist and a hateful egomaniac.

[Jackie Murphy]

12:41 AM on 05/01/2011

Thanks Groupon. I'll be visiting your site from now on.

[Lordcron]

07:09 AM on 05/01/2011

I'll second that!

[sumogirl]

10:19 PM on 04/30/2011

Thank you Groupon even though you say you never sponsored Trump's show. If I'd known of or seen an ad for the apprentice on the Groupon web site, I would have been disappointed. As it stands, I guess I'll still visit your site everyday.

[redsongia]

10:08 PM on 04/30/2011

Trump will always be able to brag that, despite the cost - financially or in popularity - he got a personal political spanking from the POTUS.

[MSaxe]

08:29 PM on 04/30/2011

That's a smart move by Groupon.

It would also be a smart move for any company currently advertising on "Anything Trump", to pull out to prevent alienating at least half of their existing and potential customers. That is unless they are Goldline, Oreck or something.