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ProMoM wants to help businesses avoid violating a mother's rights and angering customers. It is our experience that many incidents start with well-meaning, nice people who:
- may be unaware of the current laws that clarify a mother's right to nurse her child in public
- might be employees of a company that does not have a breastfeeding policy
- are new employees and are not aware of a company's pro-breastfeeding policies
- do not know how to handle other customers complaining about a breastfeeding mother.
If you are a business:
Please read
the Prevention Letter.
And, if you have any questions, comments, or need assistance writing a pro-breastfeeding policy, please
email our Executive Director.
If you are the press: Please read a copy of our press release.
Also please read
the Prevention Letter.
In addition, more information can be found about our organization through our
Contact Page and our
About Us Page, where you can find our mission statement. You can also
email our Board of Directors.
If you are a mother or supporter of breastfeeding:
Please read
the Prevention Letter. Feel free to send it to any business you like, or your local newspapers. You may also want to send your local newspapers a press release. Simply edit the places noted in the press release to customize it with your information. To find contact information for your local media, go to the Web. One possible resource is
GebbieInc;
just click on the link across the top that says Media Links.
You can also phone your local papers and ask them whom you should contact.
Historic and Current
Incidents: Breastfeeding Moms Speak Out to Educate Businesses
- SkyWest Airlines
Our January of 2006 letter to SkyWest Airlines is the end result of a chain of events which included these articles in the press from The Eureka Reporter dated 12/14/2005 and a follow up article on 1/5/2006. What if this one mother had not contacted organizations on the internet? Would SkyWest have continued to incorrectly tell mothers they could not nurse on their planes? Businesses can prevent this type of incident through education and training.
- P.F. Chang's
You can get a good idea of what happened in December of 2005 at a P.F. Chang's restaurant from our letter "Thank you P.F. Chang's!" It is also worth noting that: (1) the manager of that restaurant got many mean emails after rumors on Web sites and email newsgroups got mothers fired up and (2) the initial training that managers received from P.F. Chang's had not prepared them to deal with this situation or even informed them that there are laws clarifying mother's rights to breastfeed.
- Swimming Pools
We hear of many incidents involving pools. For example, here is our July 2005 letter responding to a string of events which started with a mother seeking support on the internet after being told by pool staff she had to go to a bathroom to nurse her child. How many mothers before her left the pool and never came back or thought they did need to hide in a bathroom?
- Employees' Jobs in Danger
Here is an example where employees were placed on leave. The business could have prevented the harassment of this mother and helped their employees maintain their jobs. Our May 2005 letter to this mall sums it up.
- Jet Blue Airlines
The Jet Blue Airlines incident in December 2003 is a classic. You can read in the response we received from Jet Blue that they implemented training after this mother caused a stir. We hope businesses don't rely on eventually running into a mother brave enough to stand up for what she knows is right. Businesses can take action now. We hope our generic letter in the section above helps businesses take the steps they need to take sooner rather than later.
ProMoM posts
3-Minute Activist Letters
that ProMoM visitors can send
to organizations or individuals following incidents of employees trying to make nursing moms leave, cover-up, or move to bathrooms to feed their children. After many mothers get angry at the business, the business will often formally apologize. We hope this more proactive approach will help businesses avoid bad press and angry emails. We theorize that the mothers on the internet quickly hear about the original incident but rarely hear about the apology and resolution. Those mothers might boycott a business or pass on to other mothers "Don't go there. They are not breastfeeding friendly."
These "For Businesses" pages are prepared by volunteers. If you'd like
to submit an idea or comment, send an email to our 3-Minute Activist Team.
The most up-to-date information on this and our other activism opportunities can
be found on our Breastfeeding
Activism Discussion Forum Board.
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