First published by Knopf Canada and Picador in December 1999,[1][2] shortly after the 1999 Seattle WTO protests had generated media attention around such issues, it became one of the most influential books about the alter-globalization movement and an international bestseller.

Throughout the four parts ("No Space", "No Choice", "No Jobs", and "No Logo"), Klein writes about issues such as sweatshops in the Americas and Asia, culture jamming, corporate censorship, and Reclaim the Streets.

She pays special attention to the deeds and misdeeds of Nike, The Gap, McDonald's, Shell, and Microsoft – and of their lawyers, contractors, and advertising agencies.

According to Klein, in response to an economic crash in the late 1980s (due to the Latin American debt crisis, Black Monday (1987), the savings and loan crisis, and the Japanese asset price bubble), corporations began to seriously rethink their approach to marketing and to target the youth demographic, as opposed to the baby boomers, who had previously been considered a much more valuable segment.

In the second section, Klein discusses how brands use their size and clout to limit the number of choices available to the public – whether through market dominance (e.g., Wal-Mart) or through aggressive invasion of a region (e.g., Starbucks).

This might mean driving down manufacturing costs or changing the artwork or content of products like magazines or albums so they better fit with Wal-Mart's image of family friendliness.

In this section, the book takes a darker tone and looks at the way in which manufacturing jobs move from local factories to foreign countries, and particularly to places known as export processing zones.

The term "McJob" is introduced, defined as a job with poor compensation that does not keep pace with inflation, inflexible or undesirable hours, little chance of advancement, and high levels of stress.

Meanwhile, the public is being sold the perception that these jobs are temporary employment for students and recent graduates, and therefore need not offer living wages or benefits.

This resentment, along with rising unemployment, labour abuses abroad, disregard for the environment, and the ever-increasing presence of advertising breeds a new disdain for corporations.

"When I started this book," she writes, "I honestly didn't know whether I was covering marginal atomized scenes of resistance or the birth of a potentially broad-based movement.

[18] Members of the English rock group Radiohead recommended the book to fans on their website and was rumored to have considered calling the album Kid A "No Logo" for a time.