January 26, 2017 (LifeSiteNews) – Chili’s Grill & Bar Restaurants have ended a promotion which saw their franchise owners in Indiana and Kentucky donating 15% of earmarked receipts to local Planned Parenthood operations.
Pro-lifers threatened to boycott Chili’s outlets nationwide and by today the corporate headquarters had pulled out of the deal.
Those who wished a portion of what they paid for their meals at the Tex-Mex style eateries to go to the country’s largest abortion provider needed only to bring in a coupon posted by the local Planned Parenthood operations on their Facebook pages. That coupon has since been removed.
In a public statement Chili’s Guest Engagement Team explained, “Yesterday, we learned that an independent franchise partner of Chili’s in Indiana and Kentucky made the decision to host a Chili’s Give Back Event on behalf of Planned Parenthood Indiana and Kentucky.”
“While our franchise partner had the best intentions; we have received growing feedback and concern from community members regarding the Give Back Event. This feedback does not reflect Chili’s focus on bringing communities together and the event was never intended to be viewed as a partisan event or political statement, therefore we, along with our franchise partner, have decided to cancel the event.”
The engagement team added that they would try to do a better job explaining how the company wants its charity tie-ins to work.
But Chili’s ran into the same problem in 2011 in the Sacramento area. A protest against a single-night promotion was organized by Wynette Simms and, as now, the event was cancelled.
At that time Chili’s said, “The event was cancelled after hearing growing concerns from our guests. While we strive to support all our community organizations, moving forward we will look for less polarizing organizations to partner with while growing our involvement in the Sacramento community.”
The latest, two-state event was to have lasted until March.