Only a few spots left to join us for the Digiday Publishing Summit

Join us Sept. 14-16 in Miami to connect with top publishing leaders

SECURE YOUR SEAT

The fashion brands that bet on messages of diversity

Amid the fear left in the wake of this fall’s terrorism attacks in Paris and California, some retailers have been caught racially profiling shoppers. Zara apologized after a video uploaded a day after the Paris attacks showed one of its stores there barring a Muslim woman wearing a hijab from entering. In Los Angeles, following the San Bernardino shooting, a Muslim woman complained that she was profiled after inquiring at a local Dick’s Sporting Goods about hunting ammo.

Some retailers that have deliberately made inclusiveness part of their brands, though. H&M featured a hijab-wearing model in a major ad campaign back in September, before the terror attacks. Net-a-Porter ran a capsule collection in June honoring Ramadan. Even Abercrombie & Fitch is trying to mend its ways — the store refused to hire a hijab-wearing woman in 2008, and the Supreme Court ruled in June against the company. Since then, Abercrombie has created a diversity and inclusion team.

More in Marketing

‘Inside, most of them are dumpster fires’: Confessions of a frustrated indie agency ad exec

From surprise corporate card cancellations to phantom return-to-office mandates, one former indie agency exec talks about the chaos behind the scenes.

The case for and against the ‘programmatic-ification’ of the creator economy

Creator marketing is racing toward AI ad-stack automation, but risks turning trust into inventory.

Digiday+ Research: The marketers’ 2026 guide to retail media marketing, including The Home Depot, Milani Cosmetics and Tinuiti

As the retail media landscape continues to evolve, marketers are rethinking where they invest, how they measure success and which retail media networks deserve a larger share of budget.