Rebrand & Social Media

Halifax Crafters would like to take a moment to acknowledge our recent rebrand launch and some activity on our Social Media.

A few weeks ago we attempted to launch a rebrand, and to be honest, we messed up. We made the mistake of initially hiding some comments regarding accessibility concerns, which is something that should not have happened. In the days that followed, we issued an initial apology, which prompted several comments, which we also did not handle well.

A specific comment included support for Halifax Crafters, while also including inappropriate language and we responded in a manner that validated the entire comment. We should not have done this, and we want to be clear that we do not condone the comment or the language used.

Additional comments were made by members of the public, some of which were disrespectful to the disability community, and we apologize for any harm they caused. That comment has been deleted and we are actively working to create a policy to better support our volunteers on social media when navigating these incidents. 

The Halifax Crafters Board is taking both of these incidents very seriously and a number of steps have already been undertaken:

• Two additional Board Meetings were held in April to discuss next steps and how to move forward. 

• Another meeting will be organized post-market to further review the events again in more detail

• We have decided to pause our rebrand until after the market, giving us additional time to seek feedback and implement changes so that we are WCAG compliant. 

• We are looking at what policies we can draft to better support our volunteers and keep ourselves accountable 

• The individual who made an inappropriate comment on our social media has been asked not to attend our upcoming Spring Market

Our team would like to take a moment to sincerely apologize for what has transpired over the past few weeks:

We apologize for not communicating more directly in the post re: our plan for the rebrand and for using the rebrand colors. 

We apologize for not holding others accountable when inappropriate language was used. 

We apologize for hiding comments on social media.

And we apologize for not doing better.

The steps outlined above are just the beginning. We recognize that this incident will require more time, and more listening from us. We plan to organize additional  meetings to ensure that we are taking accountability and getting it right. We will be providing a more comprehensive response following our upcoming Spring Market. 

Thank you.

Halifax Crafters Board