Since returning to office in the White House in January, President Donald Trump has pursued a string of policies which appear to have damaged the reputation of the US in Denmark.
Among policies directly or potentially affecting Denmark, Trump has withdrawn the US from the World Health Organization and Paris Climate Agreement, imposed tariffs against the EU and repeatedly vowed to seize control of autonomous territory Greenland. Vice President JD Vance has described Denmark as “not a good ally” of the United States.
Groups have emerged on social networks in Denmark aimed at helping fellow consumers make alternate choices, notably the Facebook group "Boykot varer fra USA" (Boycott products from the USA), which had some 88,000 members as of Tuesday.
Last month, the Salling supermarket chain decided to mark European products with a star, a move it said would help customers make more informed choices.
But completely avoiding products from US companies can be difficult, given the vast reach of such products as well as the listing of many European companies in the US.
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“There’s always the question of whether there’s a direct effect on the financial bottom line of a company,” researcher and head of department at the University of Southern Denmark’s Department of Business and Management, Dannie Kjeldgaard, said to broadcaster DR.
“Maybe there won’t be, because [Denmark] seems like a small market,” he said.
“But the protest against something American is more of a symbolic fight,” he said.
That means taking a more critical approach to broader influences from the United States, according to the researcher in his comments to DR.
“It’s being critical of the soft power the United States has had for decades through popular culture and our consumer culture,” he said.
Nevertheless, some measurable effects can also be seen when customers turn away from certain companies or products.
“We’ve also seen a genuine influence on sales figures. For example, sales of Teslas in Denmark and Europe have nosedived,” Kjeldgaard said. Tesla is owned by US billionaire and close Trump ally Elon Musk.
It’s also not unthinkable for movements like the one on Danish Facebook to get noticed in the US itself, he said.
“I’m not sure the Americans will be aware at the moment that a small market like Denmark is boycotting their products,” he said.
“But we can see that more international news outlets are starting to pick up the story,” he said.
For the boycotters, the hope will be that “big brands notice it, and we can see this is the case through share prices and declining sales figures,” he said.
“But we have closely linked value chains spanning across national borders in the production of goods,” he notes.
One example of this is a connection between Coca-Cola and Carlsberg, because Coca-Cola is bottled at a Carlsberg factory in Fredericia, the expert explained. As such, a boycott of Coca-Cola could end up affecting Danish workers.
Above all, the decision to boycott US goods by many Danes represents a “breakdown of trust” in the US caused by Trump’s administration, according to Kjeldgaard’s analysis. That loss of trust might not be easy to repair, he suggested.
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