David Yaffe-Bellany

The fast-food chain, a longtime target of LGBTQ rights groups because of its stance on same-sex marriage, has met resistance in recent months as it has looked to expand in the United States and other countries.

Chick-fil-A had to cancel the opening of a restaurant at the Buffalo, New York, airport in March after local politicians objected to it, and it cut short its plans for a British expansion last month when activists organized a boycott of its first outlet there. In September, the grand opening of Chick-fil-A’s first international location, in Toronto, was met with protesters who chanted, “Shame!”

Equal rights advocates described Chick-fil-A’s decision to stop funding the charities as a positive step but called on the chain to do more.

The Fellowship of Christian Athletes, a nonprofit that encourages stronger Christian faith in athletes, requires student leaders to sign a statement banning “any homosexual act.” The Salvation Army, a Christian charity, has been accused of discriminating against people based on their sexual orientation. (The Salvation Army maintains that it serves people of all genders and sexual orientations.)

On Monday, Chick-fil-A released a list of organizations to which its foundation has donated this year. The list did not include either organization, even though the groups had received millions of dollars from the foundation over the years.

Chick-fil-A had made “multiyear commitments” to the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes that ended in 2018, a company spokeswoman said. Now, she said, the company plans to give to “a smaller number of organizations working exclusively in the areas of hunger, homelessness and education.”

In an interview with news website Bisnow, the president of Chick-fil-A, Tim Tassopoulos, appeared to frame the decision as a response to the company’s critics.

“As we go into new markets, we need to be clear about who we are,” he said. “There are lots of articles and newscasts about Chick-fil-A, and we thought we needed to be clear about our message.”

But Chick-fil-A left open the possibility that it might resume donating to those organizations in the future. “No organization will be excluded from future consideration — faith-based or non-faith-based,” Tassopoulos said in a separate statement.

Chick-fil-A has faced widespread criticism from gay rights advocates since 2012, when Dan T. Cathy, the company’s chairman and chief executive, was quoted saying Chick-fil-A believed in the “biblical definition of the family unit.” Cathy commented after news reports revealed that the company’s foundation had donated millions of dollars to efforts to prevent the legalization of same-sex marriage in the United States.

Chick-fil-A ended nearly all its donations to groups opposed to equal rights for people of different sexual orientations in 2012. But since then, it has given money to the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. Last year, Chick-fil-A gave $1.65 million to the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and $115,000 to the Salvation Army, according to tax filings.

The Fellowship of Christian Athletes did not respond to a request for comment. A spokeswoman for the Salvation Army said the organization was “saddened to learn that a corporate partner has felt it necessary to divert funding.”

“We believe we are the largest provider of poverty relief to the LGBTQ+ population,” said Alex Yap, the Salvation Army spokeswoman. “When misinformation is perpetuated without fact, our ability to serve those in need, regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity, religion or any other factor, is at risk.”

Advocacy groups said Chick-fil-A should do more to support LGBTQ rights.

“While this is an important step for Chick-fil-A, the company still does not have workplace protections and policies that are fully inclusive of LGBTQ people,” said Beck Bailey, director of workplace equality at the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, an arm of the largest LGBTQ rights group in the United States.

Just days after Chick-fil-A’s first British restaurant opened in October, the chain said it would close the site in six months amid protests led by a group called Reading Pride.

Martin Cooper, chief executive of Reading Pride, said Chick-fil-A’s decision to stop donating to the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes had not changed the group’s position.

“It is only a step,” he said. “It’s not an action that allows us to fully forgive.”

This article originally appeared in

Chick-fil-A Stops Giving to 2 Groups Criticized by LGBTQ Advocates

Chick-fil-A said Monday that it had stopped making charitable donations to the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, groups that have been widely criticized by advocates for lesbian, bisexual, gay and transgender rights.

Now the company also faces an angry New York City Council.

On Wednesday, more than 30 members of the council sent a letter to Grubhub’s chief executive, Matt Maloney, calling for him to hire a third-party company to evaluate complaints that Grubhub has charged restaurants for phone calls that never resulted in orders.

“A refund must be issued for any phone call fees that did not yield a sale,” said the letter, a copy of which was shared with The New York Times. “In the event that you do not take corrective actions, we will explore potential legislative solutions.”

Katie Norris, a spokeswoman for Grubhub, said the company is “happy to have an open, working dialogue with the New York City Council” about how to connect consumers to local restaurants, “including improving our phone order process.”

The letter marks an escalation of the council’s monthslong investigation into the increasingly popular app-based food delivery market, which has come under scrutiny for the high fees restaurants must pay to be listed on the online platforms.

In June, the council’s small-business committee held a four-hour-long hearing in which restaurant owners decried the steep commissions — which usually range from 15-30% — that Grubhub and other food-delivery services charge on every order.

During the last few months, the chairman of the small business committee, Mark Gjonaj, has said repeatedly that he might introduce legislation to regulate the fees that the companies charge.

But the letter was the first time that a majority of the 51-member City Council has made a unified statement raising the prospect of legislation to address Grubhub’s practice of charging fees for phone calls without verifying that the calls generated orders.

Although most customers place delivery orders by tapping their smartphone screens, Grubhub allows its users to make phone calls on the app, and Yelp listings often include a Grubhub number alongside a restaurant’s direct line. Grubhub uses an algorithm to determine whether calls resulted in orders, charging restaurants based on a range of factors, including the length of the call.

But that formula is far from perfect: In recent months, restaurants have reported paying hundreds of dollars in fees for calls in which customers simply inquired about a menu item or requested a reservation. In December, Tiffin, a chain of Indian restaurants in Philadelphia, sued Grubhub, claiming that for at least seven years the company had charged restaurants on its platform for calls that did not lead to orders.

In August, Grubhub pledged to refund restaurants that could show they were charged erroneously and doubled the time it gives them to review recordings of calls, from 60 to 120 days.

“Four months is more than enough time for a restaurant to review every call they receive via our platform,” said Norris, the Grubhub spokeswoman, adding that the company is “mindful of consumer privacy concerns from keeping this data for longer.”

But restaurant owners have protested that the extended window does not go back far enough and unfairly puts the onus on small businesses to spend hours reviewing the calls. The council’s letters calls for Grubhub to hire a company to audit the full history of phone orders placed at restaurants using its platform.

“Owners do not have the time and the wherewithal to listen in to every phone call that was placed,” Gjonaj said. “It was a calculated move on behalf of Grubhub knowing that small businesses would not be looking at their statements carefully.”

Gjonaj declined to say when legislation on food delivery might be proposed. But in the coming months, the council plans to hold more hearings on food delivery, according to someone familiar with the body’s plans.

Local legislation regulating commissions, phone fees or some other aspect of the on-demand food delivery economy could pose a serious threat to Grubhub. New York is one of the company’s top-performing American markets. Across the country, Grubhub has been losing market share to its three main rivals — UberEats, Postmates and DoorDash.

Grubhub's Fees for Nondelivery Spark Backlash in New York

NEW YORK — The food-delivery giant Grubhub is having a difficult week: disappointing quarterly earnings, a declining share price, even talk of growing skepticism among investors about the broader food delivery market.

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David Yaffe-Bellany

Articles written by the author

Chick-fil-A Stops Giving to 2 Groups Criticized by LGBTQ Advocates

Grubhub's Fees for Nondelivery Spark Backlash in New York