Discussion Week 5

Please respond to both discussion topic themes (discussion #1 and #2 below) by Thursday 11:59 PM US Eastern Standard Time (EST), and reply to at least two or more other classmates posts by Sunday 11:59 PM EST. Respond to more classmates for a higher score in the Frequency rubric criteria area. Make sure you support all of your posts and replies to classmate posts with in-text citations and corresponding references from the course materials and other research. Be sure to review the rubric scoring criteria in the "Discussions - Read Me! section under the Content tab of the course to understand the grading for these assignments. You should also read the "Learn How to Support What You Write - Must Read" section under the Content tab to learn more about acceptable methods of supporting your ideas, reasoning and thus the conclusions you have drawn in your posts and other assignments.

Discussion #1

In a world of get-rich-quick schemes, few are mentioned more frequently than lawsuits. One of the most lawsuits is the infamous McDonald’s coffee case (Liebeck v. McDonald’s Restaurants  https://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm/)  which happened in 1992 in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Stella Liebeck, seventy-nine year old grandmother, was riding in a car driven by her grandson. They stopped at a McDonald’s drive-through, where she purchased a Styrofoam cup of coffee. Wanting to add cream and sugar, she squeezed the cup between her knees and pulled off the plastic lid. The entire thing spilled back into her lap. The searing liquid left her with extensive third degree burns. Eight days of hospitalization—which included skin grafts—were required. Initially, Stella Liebeck sought $20,000 from McDonald’s, which was essentially the cost of her medical bills. McDonald’s refused to pay. They went to court. There it came to light that about seven hundred claims had been made by consumers between 1982 and 1992 for similar incidents. This seems to indicate that McDonald’s knew—or at least should have known—that the hot coffee was a problem. Most of the rest of the case turned around temperature questions. McDonald’s admitted that they served their coffee at 185 degrees, which will burn the mouth and throat and is about 50 degrees higher than typical homemade coffee. More importantly, coffee served at temperatures up to 155 degrees won’t cause burns, but the danger rises abruptly with each degree above that limit. So why did McDonald’s serve it so hot? Most customers, the company claimed, bought on the way to work or home and would drink it on arrival. The high temperature would keep it fresh until then. Unfortunately, internal documents showed that McDonald’s knew their customers intended to drink the coffee in the car immediately after purchase. Next, McDonald’s asserted that their customers wanted their coffee hot. The restaurant conceded, however, that customers were unaware of the serious burn danger and that no adequate warning of the threat’s severity was provided. Finally, the jury awarded Liebeck $160,000 in compensatory damages and $2.7 million in punitive damages (about two days’ worth of McDonalds’ coffee sales). The judge, however, reduced the $2.7 million to $480,000. McDonald’s threatened to appeal, and the two sides eventually came to a private settlement agreement. Questions: 1. What were the circumstances of the accident and who was harmed? Use a stakeholder orientation as we studied in earlier weeks of the class to evaluate the harmed. 2. Define and explain the overarching ethical issues demonstrated in the Mcdonald's coffee case. 3. What does caveat emptor mean? Does the fact that Stella Liebeck is seventy-nine years old make it more difficult to justify a caveat emptor attitude in this case? 4. The concept of manufacturer liability gives consumers the right to sue manufacturers for defective goods. There are three kinds of product defect: • Design defects (errors in the product’s design) • Manufacturing defects (errors in the production of one specific case of a generally safe product) • Instructional defects (poor or incomplete instructions for a product’s safe use) 5. Which (if any) of these defects are applicable in the McDonald’s coffee case? Explain. Be sure to use the course material and other research (as appropriate) to support your points.

Discussion #2

Tappening is run by a couple of guys who do not like bottled water. The liquid is fine, but they worry about those small transparent bottles. First, the air gets polluted when they’re fabricated and then, after they have been emptied and tossed in the trash, the plastic does not quickly break down and re-enter the ecosystem. The Tappening people also notice that bottled water advertising can be deceitful. The labels and ad campaigns are known to feature mountain streams in forest paradises, breeding the idea that the water is pumped from pristine natural sources when the truth is a lot of it comes from the tap, usually with some filtering applied.

Faced with the distasteful situation—polluting water bottles and deceitful advertising—the Tappening crew could have put together some of their own ads revealing the true source of common bottled waters and the destiny of the containers, but they chose to mount a more aggressive campaign. One effort is a print ad with a crying polar bear drawn at the center, sitting on a melting arctic glacier. Under the title “Bottled Water,” the text says, “98% melted ice caps, 2% polar bear tears.” At the bottom, in small print, a message reads, “If bottled water companies can lie, we can too.”  https://adage.com/creativity/work/polar-bear-tears/16574  .

This YouTube video will provide a better understanding of the company (Tappening):  https://youtu.be/e9N0QEhRcsE

Answer the following questions:

1. In broad strokes, there are four types of deceitful advertising: those that make false claims, conceal facts, make ambiguous claims, and engage in puffery. The Tappening ad makes two apparently false claims. What are they, and what makes them seem false?

2. What are the producers trying to communicate with their claims?

3. Does the fact that the ad admits at the bottom that it’s a lie diminish (or entirely eliminate) the fact that false claims are made? Why or why not?

4. The people at Tappening believe that bottled water ads featuring flowing natural streams can be deceitful because frequently the water comes (essentially) from a faucet. What specific kind of deceitful advertising is that? Explain.

WEEK 5 REFERENCES:

 

Print

Week 5: Marketing, Brand Protection, Food Production, Agribusiness & Obesity

Theme 1: Ethical Issues Related to Marketing

The Business Ethics Workshop (2012) Washington, DC: The Saylor Foundation

Chapter 12: The Selling Office: Advertising and Consumer Protection (pages 529-566)

Offensive/Exploitive/Insensitive/Violent—short of illegal

· The Most Offensive Urban Outfitters Products to Ever Exist

· Sorry About That: Wells Fargo to End Ads Suggesting Science Over Arts

· Update: Hyundai Apologizes For Car Ad Depicting Attempted Suicide

· Ikea apologises over removal of women from Saudi Arabia catalogue

False Claims to Making One Healthier, Richer, Younger--illegal

· 14 False Advertising Scandals That Cost Brands Millions

· Controversial Lollipop Ad Goes Up in Times Square

· FTC to Crack Down on Deceptive Weight-Loss Ads

· The fall of “anti-aging” skin care

· FTC Action Puts Deceptive Marketer Out of the Debt Relief Business

· Federal Trade Commission Act Section 5: Unfair or Deceptive Acts or Practices

Exploitive/Dangerous to Children & Vulnerable Populations

· Exploitative Advertising Campaigns are Targeting our Children

· Monster drinks: Are the energy drinks marketed to children?

· E-Cigarette Ads Target Millions of Kids, CDC Says

· Study eyes candy-flavored e-cigarette ads targeted to kids

Stealth Advertising/Conflicts of Interest/Biased Reviewers

· Astroturfing: Government shills are flooding the web

· The Never-Ending War on Fake Reviews

· The Real Problem with Mommy Bloggers

Theme 2:  Ethical Issues Related to Brand Protection

Controversial Ingredients and Testing of Ingredients

· Controversial caffeinated products

· 5 Lessons Learned From Mattel's Lead Paint Crisis

· Doing Well By Doing Good

· Choking Hazards: Are Current Product Testing Methods for Small Parts Adequate?

· Animal Antibiotics

Assembly & Manufacturing Problems

· An Empirical Examination of a Multinational Ethical Dilemma: The Issue of Child Labor

· Ethical diamonds: What Conscientious Consumers Need to Know

· Conflict Minerals and Firms’ Ignorance Over Their Supply Chains

Consumer Privacy

· Tim Cook to talk consumer privacy and data ethics at European data protection conference later this month

Pricing

· Uber’s Surge Pricing: Is it Ethical?

Theme 3:  Ethical Issues Related to Food & Drink Production

· At sentencing, cantaloupe growers apologize for deadly listeria outbreak

· For first time, company owner faces life sentence for food poisoning outbreak

· Business Ethics Alive: Blue Bell vs Peanut Corporation of America

· 2.5 million pounds of taquitos recalled for salmonella, listeria concerns

Complete:  

· Participate in Week 5 discussion - Initial response due by Thursday, 11:59 p.m. eastern time.  Follow up response due by Sunday, 11:59 p.m. eastern time.