16 Feb Legal and Ethical Environment of Business
Administrative Management (BAS)
Lesson 04- Case 02
Question: After reading the Theo Chocolate, explain which of the four strategies for responding to social responsibility best reflects Theo Chocolate. Support your opinion with examples.
Requirements: Your answer must be at least 250 words and based on your own unique composition. Your answer should adhere to APA standards. Correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation are expected. Do not copy and paste someone else’s work. Plagiarism will not be tolerated.
>> I fell in love with chocolate originally as a kid. I loved Halloween candy. But up until I was a young adult, I didn’t know where chocolate came from, and so I volunteered as a conservation volunteer working with Kechi and Mopan Mayan indigenous cocoa farmers. And there were howler monkeys and you had this whole adventure in the rainforest. My curiosity was off the hook. I’m Joe, founder and CEO of Theo Chocolate.
>> I’m Debra, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Theo Chocolate. My entire life I’ve been a daily chocolate eater, but I think it really wasn’t until I got to know Joe that I started to understand the depths of the story of chocolate and all of the social and environmental issues surrounding chocolate. I think it has special powers.
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>> After my experience in Central America, I saw that social and environmental degradation were really business problems and I wanted to help save the world by making chocolate. And I got into the cocoa industry importing cocoa beans and then working with manufacturers to make chocolate and we were doing organic chocolate here in the United States and in Europe. But after doing that for several years, I saw that if, that it was most important to control the brand and the message. Control the manufacturing from the bean all the way to the finished product, and the supply chain because if I was a ver- could build a vertically integrated business, I had the best opportunity to affect every part of the business and really create lasting change.
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There were no other companies producing organic, fair trade chocolate because the barriers to entry are so high in this industry. If you wanted to go into the coffee business, all you need to do is buy a roaster and put it in your garage and you’re done. Chocolate is a very complicated product to make so the majority of chocolate is made by only about 12 companies in the whole country and they’re doing such large volume that they control not only the manufacturing but distribution and they have extreme leverage on the producers. You know we’re really interested and care deeply about where all of our ingredients come from. Our business ethic is informed by our belief that all life on the planet is interconnected, that we need consumers to be healthy and well, our farmers to be healthy and well, and the entire planet to be healthy and well in order for us to be successful and profitable. Fair trade certification is important for us to build trust with our consumers that we do what we say we’re going to do and we choose IMO Fair for Life as our certification for fair trade. What’s great about Fair for Life is that it is a certification that ensures the economic and social integrity of our entire supply chain from the cocoa farmers that we work with all the way through to our own factory operations.
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I don’t consider, I don’t consider myself a whistle-blower as much as– well let me put it this way, the industry considers me a nuisance. What really we’re doing is trying to give an alternative to practices that have contributed to social, economic, and environmental degradation. The average cocoa farmer earns less than a dollar a day for their entire family, and they have very little options in cocoa growing regions to sell other cash crops. And as a result, they’re beholden to an industry that is very oppressive. The cocoa price has been so low compared to the cost of their production that in West Africa, cocoa farmers have had to resort to slavery. One of the benefits of fair trade for cocoa farmers is that there, it’s a transparent negotiating system that allows the farmers to improve the quality which in turn delivers a much better price to them on the farm. So we see this as a truly holistic approach to not only the products that we make or accessing certain kinds of customers, but really creating a profitable business model that is having a beneficial impact on us and the planet.
>> Theo for me is an example of what Joe and I envision as enlightened capitalism. We’re the only organic fair trade certified bean-to-bar chocolate factory in the United States which is pretty exciting. So I like to say that we’re trying to define the intersection of artisan, world-class chocolate making with sustainable practices. I like to say it’s doing good while doing well. And so what that means is that we see ourselves as a triple bottom line company which means we value people, the planet, and profit in equal measure. And none of those things suffer at the expense of something else. One of the most important steps that we’ve taken to hold ourselves accountable in terms of the way that we treat our own employees is we recently underwent IMO certification for our own factory. So what that means is that we hold ourselves accountable to the same fair trade standards that our farmers undergo. So we’re subject to the same kind of scrutiny. But the reason that’s so important to us is because we’re very committed to transparency at every level of our supply chain. And so if we don’t fulfill our own, and embody our own values here within the company, within our own relationships with our own employees, then it’s really meaningless. So, and that’s an ongoing challenge for us. [music] By far the most exciting thing about Theo as we grow is that we’ve really begun to be a voice for change. As we’ve developed a really loyal following for our products and the story and the work that we’re doing in the developing world, it’s given us a certain amount of credibility in terms of what we think is necessary for change and finding platforms to share that with people in really meaningful ways. For me that’s really, really exciting.
Lesson 04- Discussion
Assuming you cannot hire entirely ethical employees, discuss your opinion of trying to teach employees to act more ethically than they might be inclined. Discuss how you would accomplish this.
· Your original post should be a minimum of 200 words and based on your own unique composition.
Legal and Ethical Environment of Business
Lesson 04 – Discussion
Keeping the Learning Objective in mind:
1. Differentiate the variety of dispute resolution processes including negotiation, mediation, and arbitration.
2. Choose and defend an Article or Amendment as an example of a constitutional requirement that affects business today.
3. Interpret how an in-depth knowledge of the U.S. Constitution or other sources of law can benefit a business.
Requirements:
1. Begin contributing to the discussions no later than midnight of the first Saturday after a lesson opens.
2. Your original post should be a minimum of 250 words and based on your own unique composition.
Lesson 04- Case Brief Assignment
For every Case Brief:
You must find a case related to the weekly chapter. You can pull your case from the book or from the internet as long as you cite the sources.
Please write a short synopsis of the case using the brief outline below no longer than two pages. The synopsis should be typed, double-spaced, times new roman 12 font and printed in black ink.
Case brief written assignment expectations:
- Facts: This should be a quick list of facts, but make sure to include any legally significant facts.
- Procedural history: These are notes about the journey the case has taken through the court system.
- Issue presented: What is the legal issue that the court is discussing? Note, there can be more than one issue.
- Holding: This is the ruling of the court. If the issue presented is a question for the court to answer, then the holding is the answer to that question.
- Legal reasoning: This is a quick summary of the thought process used by the court to reach their conclusion.
- Rule of law: If the court applied any rules of law that are important, you want to write that down too.
- Concurring or dissenting opinions (if any): If your casebook included a concurring or dissenting opinion in your reading, you will need to read it carefully. It is there for a reason.
10.
