While two animal rights groups flagged Condé Nast’s pledge to no longer feature animal fur in global editorial content or advertising as “breaking news,” a company spokesperson said Monday that the company’s values and guidelines have reflected this for many years.

Condé Nast touched upon the company’s approach in its 2025-30 Sustainability Strategy, which notes, “Across our titles, we do not feature new animal fur in editorial content or advertising.”

The Coalition to Abolish the Fur Trade appeared to take credit for that, after leading “a relentless nine-month campaign,” according to the group’s executive director Suzie Stork. Those efforts included “months of sustained pressure by CAFT activists across the world, including disruptive demonstrations and residential picketing of Condé Nast executives,” she said.

In August, for example, animal rights activists supporters protested with bullhorns outside of the home of Vogue’s deputy editor Taylor Antrim. That was said to be one of more than 100 protests that targeted Condé Nast employees and some of the media company’s business affiliates, such as Mattel. During another incident, a man, who was identified as a “deaf animal rights activist,” was arrested on Sept. 28, during what CAFT described as “a peaceful lawful protest” for disturbing the peace outside of the home of Teen Vogue’s features director Brittney McNamara in Paxton, Mass. A representative at the Paxton Police Department was not immediately available Monday to comment.

CAFT said there were also demonstrations inside the American Girl Doll store, due to its connection to Condé Nast.

CAFT was said to have targeted Condé Nast’s prized title Vogue (and “harassed many employees in the process”) without citing any examples of new fur in Vogue’s content, according to one source.

The International Fur Federation’s chief executive officer Mark Oaten said, “It’s disappointing that Condé Nast has taken this decision and it suggests they are frightened by animal activists. Next they will have to ban wool or leather adverts, as the activities won’t stop at fur. They should have been brave and let their readers decide what they want to buy. It won’t impact the fur sector, as we have not advertised with them for a few years.”

CAFT, which previously initiated campaigns against Marc Jacobs, Max Mara and other fashion brands, is now focusing its “full attention on Berluti and the other LVMH holdouts that continue to profit from the cruel fur trade,” Stork said.

While major designers and big-name retailers like Neiman Marcus stopped selling animal fur products several years ago, the faux fur apparel business is on track for growth. In 2023, the global synthetic fur market was $371.3 million, and it is expected to reach $863 million by 2033, according to the New York-based research firm Market.us.

There are an estimated 1,100 retailers and 100 manufacturers that specialize in fur with 85 percent of them being family-run operations that have been passed down from one generation to the next, according to the Fur Information Council of America. A FICA spokesperson deferred comment until later in the day Monday. For decades, fur was associated with a high-rolling luxury lifestyle along with jumbo diamonds and stilettos. To that end, the Blackglama “What Becomes a Legend Most?” advertising campaign was a coveted coup among celebrities with Marlene Dietrich, Joan Crawford, Martha Graham, Rudolf Nureyev, Raquel Welch, Ray Charles, Cher, Maggie Smith, Brigitte Bardot, Bette Davis, Catherine Deneuve, Linda Evangelista, Lauren Bacall and Gisele Bündchen being among the featured talent through the years.

Years before current Condé Nast staffers were targeted by CAFT supporters, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals had lobbied against Vogue and its leader Anna Wintour, who now serves as chief content officer for Condé Nast and global editorial director. Wintour was unruffled after being heckled by PETA, during a 2009 talk at the 92Y in New York. She was targeted earlier, while lunching at the Four Seasons with Paul Cavaco, Grace Coddington and Charles Churchward in 1996. An unidentified woman told the maitre d’ that she was with Wintour’s party and was promptly directed to the group’s table, where she removed a dead raccoon from a shopping bag and flung it right onto the Vogue editor’s coffee cup. True to form, the unflappable Wintour turned to her boss, Steve Florio, seated at the next table, and said, “Merry Christmas.” (Wintour cooly finished her coffee — from another cup, of course, according to a WWD report.)

In an unsolicited email, PETA’s director of media relations Moira Colley said, “Vogue has finally gotten the ‘fur is dead’ memo. PETA started the movement against the atrociously cruel fur industry back in the [19]90s, leading to top designers shedding fur, and filthy fur factory farms shutting down on a global scale. Now, it’s time for publishers, designers and retailers to evolve beyond featuring and promoting leather, too, as animal skins are nothing more than hairless fur also stolen from animals who suffer and die in hideously cruel ways.”

Last month PETA unveiled a billboard featuring the actress Caylee Cowan to play up plant leather and “to redefine leather.”