While everyone else on the conservative side of the blogosphere today is marveling over the concurrent train wreck of the Biden-Trump “debate” last night, and the “deer in the headlights” reaction from the Establishment Media over their horrible realization that they can’t possibly pull any kind of media veil over the wreckage – I just thought that I might wander off on another tangent. I’ll meditate and marvel a little on there on how a national retail corporation pulled decisively back from the brink of a Bud Light-like, company-wrecking disaster. I speak of the Tractor Supply turn-around. I should like to have been eavesdropping in the C-level suite of Tractor Supply’s headquarters, when everyone concerned there realized that going all out for progressive causes like DEI/DIE, the Pride Mafia and open borders was about as popular with their rural and suburban fly-over country market demographic as a case of genital warts. I would assume that the meeting where they realized “Oh-krep-on-a-biscuit-we-gotta put a stop to it now before we lose our phony-baloney jobs!” was pretty epic.

All props for even coming to that realization, and another round of props for acting decisively in putting out a statement strongly emphasizing action steps, instead of one of those sniveling and mealy-mouthed ‘we’re-so-sorry-that-you-stupid-proles-were-offended’ non-apology apologies. The current retail and entertainment landscape is littered with the still-twitching corpses of entities who went all in for DEI/DIE, the glories of randy Pride parades and free-lance gender-bending, and expecting their customers/audience to sit still for wokie lectures. In the future – if university marketing courses even have a future – likely there will be a couple of compare-contrast chapters on how Bud Light and Tractor Supply handled the fiasco resulting from dissing their customers.

For myself, I’ve always been a bit embarrassed about rolling up to a Tractor Supply store, or any other local feed and seed outlet driving a small sedan. One really ought to be in a slightly battered not-quite-new pickup truck with a layer of dirt on the paint and mud on the tires. While I don’t live on a ranch or farm, we have kept chickens in the past, and the spoiled avians preferred chowing down on the brand available there. They also have a pretty good array of pet foods, deer corn, sundry dry goods and work clothing, garden and outdoor items and country kitsch. We’ve bought a chicken coop there, a dog crate, plants, seeds and large-capacity mason jars for home canning … and when we start with chickens again, we might just go regularly again.

Still, though – there are independent, non-chain farm and ranch supply stores, and genuine old-style feed stores around here. Like this one, or this one. Or this small local chain, which has an outlet just up the road from us.