Here it is -the Woolworth's other 'Happy Christmas' advert courtesy of Getup. Please blare and share and dare your...
Posted by Gypsy Jack on Monday, 21 December 2015
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Showing posts with label Poker machines. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Poker machines. Show all posts
Tuesday, 22 December 2015
How does Woolworths affect your family, your community? Getting Fresh with pokies ....
Friday, 15 February 2013
Congratulations to Castlemaine & Campbells Creek - a battle has been joined & won against pokies
In April last year, I was travelling to Bendigo from Ballarat and at Campbells Creek on the southern outskirts of Castlemaine when I came across the sign pictured above. Now, in my view, it takes a lot to get individual householders into action to make their own signs and show their colours on a particular issue. This was not the only sign I saw and realised that this was red-hot local issue. Later enquiries, explained why the locals were protesting.
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Friday, 6 July 2012
History made to-day in GetUp! v Woolworths. Woolworths withdrew. A really Extraordinary General Meeting coming up.
HAVE JUST GOT MY EMAIL FROM GETUP!
WHAT A SUCCESS!
CONGRATULATIONS!
BIG THANKS TO ALL WHO ARE HELPING TO FUND THE ACTION!
We've just walked out of Federal Court and are pleased to say that there will be an Extraordinary General Meeting of Woolworths to discuss and vote on making the company's high-loss poker machines safer for communities. -- In a nutshell, Woolworths was today unsuccessful in denying GetUp members and Woolworths shareholders the right to an EGM about poker machine reform.They did however manage to buy some extra time before that meeting; it will now happen in November. -- Woolworths sought the court's permission to deny the Extraordinary General Meeting GetUp members requisitioned to discuss pokies reform. During the course of the hearing, it became clear that application would be unsuccessful, and Woolworths withdrew it. Woolworths will now be the only top company in Australian history to be forced into holding an EGM on a social justice issue. We know this separate, 'extraordinary' meeting is important because of our experience at last year's regular Woolworths Annual General Meeting. Woolworths shareholders and GetUp members -- including some who had lost loved ones to gambling addiction -- attended the AGM and challenged the board on their dangerous high-loss poker machines, but the company did everything they could to minimise the issue. This meeting will be very different. Woolworths will have to contact all 432,000 of their shareholders with a 1,000 word letter from GetUp members, making the ethical and business cases for limiting the company's poker machines to $1 bets. Allshareholders will then be able to vote on a motion to change the company's constitution to enforce such a change. We didn't get everything we hoped for today. Justice Yates granted Woolworths a time extension to save Woolworths "unnecessary costs" and travel time for the company's directors. That means the EGM will be pushed to November, when Woolworths hold their AGM. We maintain that the meeting request was legitimate and that its cost was reasonable, amounting to less than Woolworths pockets from addicted problem gamblers in a single day. From here, we'll be ramping up the campaign for safer poker machines in advance of the EGM, so stay tuned for stories from some of our most courageous members who are speaking up with the hope of influencing the vote of shareholders and the position of the Board of Directors. With thanks, the GetUp team. PS - If you have a story you'd like to share with us (and haven't already) about high-loss poker machines, like the ones Woolworths' owns and operates, and how they have impacted you or a loved one, please email us at: info@getup.org.au so we can include it in the booklet of stories we're putting together in advance of the EGM. THE OTHER SIDE OF THE STORY 6.50am Saturday 7 July 2012 When I published the GetUp! letter last night, I did not have the news story published by the ABC. So Networkers have the whole picture here is the link to the ABCNews story. |
Thursday, 17 May 2012
Woolworths, Coles, the TV Corporates, and the banned ad
Have you seen our banned ad?
It's all over the news: the TV ad GetUp members funded calling on Woolworths and Coles to make their poker machines safer, has been blocked by Channels Ten, Seven and Nine.
Nine actually told a journalist straight: it would be "illogical to ruin relationships with valued, and longstanding,clients for the sake of GetUp's campaign."[1] We won't let that stop us.
Already, a GetUp member with expertise in cinema advertising has volunteered to help, and we've booked cinema ads right across the country to get around the TV blackout. Thanks to a great discount rate, we can actually reach even more customers of Woolworths and Coles.
Now is our chance to show the TV bosses that they can't stop our movement spreading the truth. We we won't let a network ban stop us from having our voices heard -- and by blocking us on TV, they've only given us more media attention for this important campaign.
Check out the ad TV stations don't want you to see. A $57 donation will buy a full weekend of ads in one cinema, reaching hundreds of Coles and Woolies customers.
 http://www.getup.org.au/ Thanks for fighting back, The GetUp Team. 'Networks refuse to air anti-pokie ads', Richard Willingham. The Age, May 16, 2012 |
Tuesday, 22 November 2011
Woolworths : can you trust a grocer who owns the largest number of high-loss gambling machine venues in Australia
Senator Nick Xenophon with a sign that tells the story.
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Australia is home to the largest number of dangerous high-loss pokie machines in the world – and grocery giant Woolies is the king of the hill: the largest pokie machine venue owner in the country, with more pokie machines than the top five Las Vegas casinos combined![1]
Why? Pure dollars: owning hotels with pokie machines is reportedly three times more profitable than selling groceries. No one would know this better than Australia's trusted household brand, which now has more than 12,000 computerised gambling machines in around 300 hotels across the country.[2]
These machines have been called the "crack cocaine" of gambling. Players are estimated to lose hundreds of millions of dollars annually.[3] They’re designed to be highly addictive, especially to those already prone to problem gambling, making them uniquely profitable to big corporations and destructive to the lives of thousands of Australian families. Plenty of Woolworths customers – and shareholders – are not happy that the ‘Fresh Food People’ are heavily profiting from an industry that’s taking the food off so many family tables. Together, we’re taking our voices to the top by presenting your petition directly to senior executives at this Thursday's Woolworths AGM.
Imagine the look on the faces of these back room executives when we tell them directly how many shareholders, employees and customers of Woolworths want them to better serve their customers by coming out in support of pokie reform. We won't reveal your name to Woolworths but the total number will be powerful. Can you let us know if you are a Wooloworths customer, employee or shareholder?
http://www.getup.org.au/
It’s alarming enough that a trusted family brand has out-invested the top five Las Vegas casinos in pokie machines – but they’ve also made it clear that they don't think that their many customers who have been devastated by the impacts of problem gambling are their problem. Earlier this year the head of Woolworths' gambling subsidiary spoke in front of a parliamentary inquiry and shamelessly compared gambling addiction to hamburgers by saying: ''I think the product is safe. Some people have addictions, be it to fast food or drugs…are we asking, is a hamburger safe?" [4] Woolworths representatives sit on the executive board of the Australian Hotels Association, who are jointly responsible with Clubs Australia for the so called '$20 million' mass advertising campaign against pokies reform.[5]
Woolworths may have the dollars, but with more than 585,000 of us across the country – many of whom are Woolies' shareholders, employees and customers – we can change the direction of the company. Some concerned individuals have already volunteered to allow GetUp to send “proxies” on their behalf to the AGM – spokespeople who will represent them, and speak directly about their personal experience of the devastating effects of problem pokie gambling (and present your petition). It's a rare opportunity to take our message directly to the top and have it delivered, not by an outside group of activists, but through the company's own concerned shareholders. Add your voice now: let us know if you’re a Woolworths shareholder, employee or customer and be part of the message to company executives on Thursday.
http://www.getup.org.au/
An Annual General Meeting is the one chance we get each year to bypass the usual spin doctors and media gate holders and speak directly to the company chair and senior executives, publicly, and on the record.
The truth is, Woolworths can more than afford to curb problem gambling and still profit handsomely from recreational pokie players, alongside all their other business. We frankly expect better of a trusted Australian family brand than to fund a massive and misleading ad campaign against pokie reform. We've already got a 45,000 strong petition of Australians supporting reform to limit problem gambling, and now we will tell Woolworths just how many of their customers, shareholders and employees have signed it.
Thank you for all that you do,
Erin, for the GetUp team
[1]"Woolworths hits the jackpot with pokies after signing deal with Laundy hotel group", Daily Telegraph. November 11, 2011
[2]"Woolworths in pokie grip talks", Sydney Morning Herald. April 18, 2011
[3]"Woolies is poker machine king", Daily Telegraph. November 12, 2011
[4]"Playing pokies just like eating a burger, says Woolies subsidiary", Sydney Morning Herald. February 15, 2011
[5]"Woolworths revealed to own more pokies than the Adelaide Casino", News.com.au. April 16, 2011
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