Billboard and tube adverts across London have been replaced with more than 100 satirical artworks protesting against the “destructive hyper-consumerism of Black Friday” and the marketing strategies of big tech companies such as Amazon.
Artists in the anonymous artist network Brandalism say they have hacked commercial advertising spaces to critique Amazon’s role in tax avoidance, labour rights abuses and environmental harms, which they allege are covered up on a huge scale by large marketing budgets.
One poster designed by artist Michelle Tylicki, showed a Monopoly board with positive social initiatives, including affordable green housing and solar energy, beneath a looming Amazon logo. A card in the foreground reads: “If the Ultra-Rich paid their fair share of taxes…”.
Mass Amazon worker strikes and walk-outs are happening today, on Black Friday, following similar actions organised by the group Make Amazon Pay since 2020. In 2024 Amazon paid UK corporation tax for the first time since 2020. Ethical Consumer estimates that in 2024 alone, Amazon’s corporation tax avoidance may have cost the UK exchequer around £575 million in lost revenue.
Posters inserted over ads in London Underground tube carriages critique the energy intensity of Amazon’s data centres and compare billionaire tech CEOs with common parasites.
Brandalism say the extra round of consumerism on Black Friday and Cyber Monday creates an unsustainable surge in consumer waste – with employee injury rates at Amazon warehouses spiking to meet the increase in advertising-driven demand.
Another satirical artwork by Wrench showed an Amazon data centre next to a forest fire in the Amazon, drawing a link between the company’s substantial investments in energy-hungry AI and environmental destruction. Leaked internal documents have recently revealed that Amazon strategised to avoid public disclosure of the true extent of the water use of its datacentres.
Tona Merriman, a Brandalism spokesperson, said:
“Amazon epitomises 21st century destructive hyper-consumerism; bombarding us with advertising in the run up to Black Friday whilst squeezing the pay and conditions of workers, amassing eye-watering profits and then dodging its taxes. It relies on public services like healthcare, transport and education to operate yet minimises its tax contributions to fund them. The UK government needs to reset the social contract and stand up to Big Tech and their billionaire CEOs. We can’t afford them.”
Make Amazon Pay!
