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Business Marketing Ethics:
Snuff Out Joe Camel
Business Marketing Ethics: Snuff out Joe Camel
Reynolds is acting in an unethical and socially irresponsible manner
R.J. Reynolds' use of Joe Camel smacks of "target marketing" toward children. The use of a "cool" cartoon figure surrounded by admiring friends and an attractive girlfriend seems tailor-made for enticing children, who are drawn to cartoon figures and crave acceptance and "coolness" at least as much as adults crave acceptance and "coolness." The targeting of children for an "adults-only" product is particularly reprehensible because children are a recognized vulnerable group; the vulnerability of children is the reason for so many laws treating them as "infants" who cannot decide for themselves. In the face of our society's treatment of children as a vulnerable group that must be protected, Joe Camel is an anti-social use of marketing.
Marketing to children is particularly harmful when that marketing encourages smoking. An important reason for the...
That child-to-adult addiction carries a terrible social price: smoking is the addictive cause of more yearly deaths in the U.S. than alcohol, AIDS, car accidents, illegal drugs, murders, and suicides combined, according to the "Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids." Consequently, R.J. Reynolds' reference to other brands such as Ford, Chevrolet, McDonalds, and Coca Cola, which do not regularly kill nearly as many Americans, is a weak appeal when faced with the impacts of smoking on health.
Finally, assuming for argument's sake that R.J. Reynolds did not initially target children,…
Finally, assuming for argument's sake that R.J. Reynolds did not initially target children, Joe Camel apparently did create hordes of child-addicts and RJ. Reynolds knew or should have known that and reacted as an ethical company. R.J. Reynolds is a wealthy company that probably keeps careful track of who smokes its cigarettes and an ethical company would have stopped using Joe Camel after realizing that: the percentage of smokers under 18 who smoke Camels has risen from less than 1% to nearly 33% since the company began using Joe Camel; nearly one-quarter of Camel's sales are to underage smokers; kids smoke the most heavily advertised brands, and Camel has been the second most advertised brand since 1988. Rather than "pulling the plug" on Joe Camel in the face of all that information, R.J. Reynolds was apparently secretly thrilled with the child-addicts and kept using Mr. Camel quite heavily, even when attorneys' general from more than 27 states petitioned the FTC to sue the company and ban Joe Camel.
2. How my decision will affect the stakeholders of R.J. Reynolds and which stakeholders should be pleased first and second
Using the broadest definition of "stakeholder," the anti-smoking stakeholders such as children, parents, anti-smoking groups, U.S. "society" and the U.S. Healthcare system will be favorably affected by a ban on Joe Camel because the ban will stop this method of marketing an addictive "adults-only" product to a vulnerable group. Meanwhile, the pro-smoking stakeholders such as R.J. Reynolds, its employees and its stockholders, will be harmed by the ban because the ban will stop an effective marketing tool. Parents should be the first stakeholders pleased by the ban because their children are no longer targeted by Joe Camel and are less likely to smoke. Secondly, the U.S. Healthcare system should be pleased because fewer child addicts will mean fewer adult addicts, which should reduce the strain on our health system from smoking.
S. Court Systems don't happen again (Lewis, 2005). In January, 1997 an unannounced audit by Ernst & Young uncovered violations of worker safety throughout a Vietnamese contract manufacturing plant where children were also found working well over the hours they were allowed to under international law (Lewis, 2005). The workers had no idea they were working for world-known Nike at the time. Not a single worker had been shown a code
Fox, R.F. (2001, November). Warning Advertising May Be Hazardous to Your Health: Ads Pose a Threat to Physical, Emotional, Social, and Cultural Well-Being. USA Today, Volume 130, Issue 2678, 62. The author discusses different types of advertising and promotion and finds ethical problems in the way many are handled, especially with reference to advertising and promoting goods and services to children. He cites the use of focus groups for toy companies
Determining this could be difficult and time consuming. It is nonetheless a necessary step towards successful and sustainable market entry. A culture whose values are, for example, alienated by a marketing campaign is likely to be alienated and will not deliver a sustainable customer base for the success of the company. Ultimately, what the article focuses on, is that success in the long-term depends upon a company's ability to enter
On one hand, public corruption is a case generally handled by both national authorities and international organizations and institutions, having been prioritized as a necessity that needs the full attention of society. Private corruption is less in the public's eye and generally left to be handled by each organization in part. The different approach to bribery may be caused, as the writer tacitly acknowledges, by the fact that there is
Marketing Ethics in Marketing BP and Toyota have been in the news due to serious failures, which created significant safety risk and ultimately resulted in deaths as well as significant environmental damage in the case of BP with the exposition on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig. In both cases there were internal failures. In these two cases there were notable failures which received a high level philosophy and have damaged the reputations
What types of sports events do they go to? Are they Web savvy? Are they frequent fliers? Once you develop that kind of intimate understanding of your shoppers, you can truly begin to cultivate their loyalties" (Pedersen 1999:1). On one hand, this may make consumers uncomfortable -- but it may also mean that when a supermarket chain discovers that the majority of its customers have young children, the chain may