Eti, a leading company in the food industry, changed the name of Eti Negro, one of its well-established brands. It announced that the word Negro was amended because it is used as an expression of discrimination due to skin color in some countries.
In the statement made by Eti Gıda, it was said that their only goal for 60 years since the first day of their establishment has been to offer quality and unique tastes to their consumers.
The company's statement went on as follows:
“With a great commitment to our founding vision and above all to our corporate values based on respect for human beings, we are working to add happiness to life all over the world with our more than 7 thousand employees, 9 production facilities, 50 brands, and more than 300 products. Eti Negro is one of our well-established brands and has been enshrined in the hearts of our consumers with its quality and taste. Our biscuit is close to black in color due to the high amount of cocoa in its content and was named for this fact. The word negro, which expresses the color black in Spanish, has become the name of the cocoa biscuit in the eyes of Turkish consumers.
Discrimination due to skin color, contrary to human rights and all human values, is unfortunately still among the biggest problems in the globalizing world. Today, the word negro can, unfortunately, be used as an expression of discrimination in some countries. We can never accept that our brand name, which we had chosen years ago to identify our cocoa biscuit, is used with negative connotations, even if it is not the case in our country and culture.
THE RISK OF BREAKING THE HEART OF EVEN ONE PERSON!
Therefore, as a company that aims to serve people's happiness, we regard the risk of breaking the heart of even one single person as a reason sufficient for changing the brand name. As a result of the studies we have carried out for a long time with the sensitivity and responsibility we shoulder on this subject, we are changing the name of Eti Negro brand in Turkey and in the export markets. As a brand name, we decided to continue with the name “Nero”, which means black in Italian and will highlight the intense cocoa content of our biscuits before our consumers. We will present our product, which provides a quality biscuit experience, to the market with the brand Eti Nero with the same content and taste.”