Broad consumer brands that want to reach large audiences with pretty generic messages are probably the ones most concerned with brand-safe spaces, like softdrinks, shampoo, etc. They want to reach everyone without annoying anyone. I don't really think reddit is a great platform for that type of ads anyway. These advertisers can probably find other, brand-safe platforms where they can reach a wide audience without risk of negative exposure. I don't think cleaning up reddit to please these advertisers is going to make much difference, apart from pissing of the users.
There are, however, lots of smaller subreddits that could offer very different value to advertisers – relevance. These are the communities of people dedicated to a specific (niche) interest. People go there for updates on a particular topic or interest. The visitors to these subreddits are far more likely than average to be interested in purchasing products tied to their interest, which would make putting an ad there far more relevant than in other channels. If you sell/make power washers, wouldn't an ad in r/powerwashingporn make a lot of sense? Wouldn't r/photocritique be a pretty good place to advertise your new online photography course? Many of these enthusiast subreddits are also pretty drama- and controversy-free. People may disagree with each other, but they're mostly there to enjoy the stuff they're interested in rather than fighting. To me, the self-segmented nature of subreddits seems like one of the most promising opportunities for the company to make money.