Free Report On Ethical Consumerism

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Executive Summary

The entire analysis relates to the Ethical Consumerism stance of McDonalds, one of the largest organizations of the world which is operating in the Fast Food Industry. The entire analysis is in the favor of McDonalds in terms of providing the ethical consumerism to their consumers, however there are some loopholes as well within their functionality that needed to be overcome accordingly with the help of powerful recommendation, and it also assist the company to maintain their significance in the market of Fast Food.

Introduction

It is observed that both financial and strategic well being is powerful and essential for the sake of an organization, and without the financial and strategic prosperity, it is not possible for the companies to maintain their level of competitiveness and effectiveness in a given market. Ethics are the practice or a medium of ethical practices which are essential for a company to comply with it for their long run sustainability (Devinney, Auger and Eckhardt, 2010).
Every company operates in a sort of Industry, and every industry has some sort of ethics pertain to their long run significance. It is essential for a company to comply with the prescribed and given standards of the industry and increase the level of Ethical Consumerism. The main objective of this assignment is to increase the stance of Ethical Consumerism of a given organization, and how the company can increase this stance accordingly and in the best possible manner for the company (Fridell, 2007).
The company which has been chosen for the same analysis is McDonalds. There is a business report structure which has been following in this particular assignment that includes options surveys and analysis as well. It is also important to have a detailed outlook over the definition of Ethical Consumerism and its importance for the enterprises.

Ethical Consumerism: A Detailed Outlook

Theoretically, ethics is known as a Moral Philosophy that involves systemization, defending and recommendation of the concepts and strategies regarding the right and wrong. Ethics is a Greek word which introduced the concept of well doing pertains to an organization. There are numerous types of ethics are there, and one of the major types of Ethics is Organizational Ethics (Fridell, 2007).
Organizational Ethics are the set of practices which are essential to comply by the entities in order to cope up with any issue or problem. Organizations are always required to comply with the ethical standards set by their respective industries for them, as it is the only thing from which they can sustain in the industry for a long span of time. Under the ambit of organizational ethics, there is a name of “Ethical Consumerism” as well (Devinney, Auger and Eckhardt, 2010).
Ethical Consumerism is a broad term which has its recognition in numerous parts like Ethical Consumption, Ethical sourcing, purchasing and Green Consumerism. Ethical Consumerism is a major type of Consumer activities that based on their dollar voting. It is known as the practices of buying the products. Ethical Consumerism apply towards the organizations who are directly engages with the consumers in order to become effective in their operations. The term Ethical Consumerism now used in different parts of the world, and it was first introduced by the UK magazine in the year 1989. According to the magazine, the industry will rank the companies according to the standards prescribed and set forth by them on the basis of their production and operations. Therefore, the key innovation of Ethical Consumerism is to produce the ratings on the basis of a table that used for the compliance behavior of the companies (Devinney, Auger and Eckhardt, 2010).
The stance of ethical consumerism varies from organization to organization and from industries to industries as other company pertains to a specific industry has different sort of ethical consumerism associated with them, which are very important for them to comply effectively for their betterment and sustaining in the industry for a specific time period. McDonalds which has been chosen for this assignment operates in a fast food restaurant industry which is one of the most lucrative industries in the world , however it has number of ethical consumerism stance as well which will be discussed in the upcoming sections of the report.

Company Review

The McDonald Corporation is known as the world’s largest chain of hamburger of the fast food restaurants that has the accolade to serve nearly 68 million people on daily basis in 119 different countries of the world. There are currently 35,000 outlets are with the company. It has its headquartering located in the United State (Devinney, Auger and Eckhardt, 2010).
There are number of aspects from which the company is generating revenues for them. The revenue of McDonalds comes from different sources such as royalties, rent and the fees paid by the franchises. Apart from that, the sales generated through the selling out of the products of the company are an important aspect of revenue for them. Apart from generating high amount of revenues in different parts of the world, the company is known as the second largest employer after Wal-Mart Inc. There are 1.9 million are working with Wal-Mart, while the number of employees working with McDonalds is 1.5 million.
There are number of products in which the company is currently dealing that include hamburgers, cheese burgers, breakfast, cold drinks, milk shakes, desserts and others. However, they are very popular for their hamburgers. Andrew J. McKenna is the current Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the company which has been working with the company from last few years, but the CEO of the company did an exceptional job as far as maintaining their effectiveness.
The restaurants of McDonalds are currently found in around 118 countries of the world. The company is complying with the ethical standards and stance associated with them. With increasing their revenue recognition, the company is increasing the dividends of the shareholders from last 25 years, showing the effectiveness of the company in terms of managing their core operations in the market. The company is currently facing the stance of many competitors from different parts of the world; however they are still in the perfect marketplace to enhance their productivity. McDonalds come under the ambit of Food Industry. The company had generated net revenue of US$ 28.10 Billion in the financial year 2013 and generated net income of 5.58 billion US$ in the same year
It is showing that the revenue recognition of the company is very powerful and effective, and they are doing an exceptional job in terms of satisfying the needs of their investors as well as their consumers in a productive, effective and ethical manner. McDonalds is effectively complying with all the latest standards associated with the company’s functions and productivity (Keinert, 2008).
The Fast Industry of the United States is increasing with a robust pace, and it is referred as one of the fastest growing industries of the country. Companies which are operating in this industry having a great time in making billions of dollars, however, the association of prevailing laws and regulations are some of the major things that made this industry a challenging one. According to the Ethical Reports related to Fast Food Industry, usage of oil and salts is very dangerous for the health of the human beings; therefore the amount of salt and oil should be used in a lower amount to comply with these standards.
McDonalds which had envisaged a real downturn in their 2014’s sales has a direct connection with the ethical stance and standard of Food based problem or issue. The company has now reduced the amount of salt and unsaturated fats by 11% in their products in order to increase their ethical consumerism and complies with the standards made by the food regulation industry of the United States. The amount of obesity and obese people are increasing heavily in the region of the United States, and the awareness regarding the obesity is also increasing in other countries as well which are creating problems for their consumers.
It is a corporate social responsibility (CSR) of McDonalds to come with such products which are healthier and effective for the people and now McDonalds is doing the same (Lewis and Potter, 2011). Apart from that, ethical consumerism act required the manufacturer of a product to pen down the ingredients which have been used to make the products accordingly (Lewis and Potter, 2011). McDonalds is complying comprehensively with the same regulation aspect to become effective and powerful in this region with full of ethics and standards rating. The Government of the United States awarded high available points to McDonalds for the Ethical Consumerism, however there are number of things which are still required to be completed accordingly in the given market place and remain competitive and effective in this fast growing industry.

Opinion Survey

Opinion survey is one of the most important methods to get the opinion regarding the betterment and improvement of a company’s operations and its way towards their consumers (Keinert, 2008). It is required to choose a data collection method from which the data as well as the opinion of the people regarding the services of the company can be collected for the betterment of the company (Lewis and Potter, 2011). In order to enhance the ethical consumerism of McDonalds a bit further, it is more than important for the company to review their stance from the people and have their opinion right away. Secondary Research approach has been used in this particular analysis in which the opinion of 100 people has been taken into account for enhancing the level of ethical consumerism in McDonalds.

Q-1) Are the current Products of McDonalds relate to the Ethical Consumerism Stance in terms of Quality?

The question has been asked with the respondents related with the current strategy of McDonalds in terms of enhancing the level and stance of Ethical Consumerism. The opinion of the respondents against this particular question is mentioned below
According to the graph mentioned in Appendix B-i, 49% of the respondents are in the fact that the current products of the company is powerful and complies with the stance of Ethical Consumerism, which means that the quality of the products of the company compel the respondents to have the products of McDonalds. On the other hand, 29 out of 100 respondents are totally against this idea.

Q-2) Are McDonalds are concentrated towards the orientation of their consumers in terms of health management issues?

This question requires answering the approach of McDonalds in terms of complying with the health management issues of the individuals.
According to Graph, mentioned in Appendix-B (ii), Unfortunately, after reducing the salt factor from their products by 11%, the health management issues are still in the connection with the company, nearly 43% of the people are against this fact.

Q-3) What else are required by McDonalds to enhance the level of their Ethical Consumerism?

This question is included in the analysis section to gain an idea regarding the future strategies that should be employing by McDonalds to further increase their ethical consumerism stance. Mentioned below result is found
According to Appendix-B (iii), 37% of the respondents are thinking that the providence of Quality and Health Foods that also complies with the food industry regulation is the most important element that should be utilize by the company to enhance the level of ethical consumerism. Apart from that Ethical Advertising and Competitive Analysis are some other aspects that should be utilized by the company to have the ethical consumerism within their operations and productivity. The proportions of these elements are 21% and 18% respectively.

Conclusion

Strategic Management is known as the most refined and powerful form of the managerial aspects and functions for an organization. It is a type of strategies that used to enhance the financial as well as strategic functions of the company in a prescribed and powerful manner. Due to the Globalization, the entire world has now come in a single hand from which they can compete with each others with positive mindset and freely as well.
Apart from business ethics that used to comply with the standards to operate a business, there are certain standards that specifically associated with the consumers and customers of the companies. Such ethical standards are known as Ethical Consumerism. The main theme of this order relates to the ethical consumerism stance of McDonalds. From this entire analysis, it is clear that the McDonalds is complying effectively and positively with the ethical stance and standards and they are doing an exceptional job as far as maintaining strong stance in their core operations. The Opinion survey has also revealed that providing quality and healthy products will make the things in the favor of the company as far as providing effectiveness to the is concerned. There are some aspects that needed to be overcome by the company to have effectiveness in their core operations.

Recommendations

Secondly, it is suggested to the management of the company to have a vigilant look over its Quality products and providing of Green Environment in order to have a constant running of Ethical consumerism.

References

Devinney, T., Auger, P. and Eckhardt, G. (2010). The myth of the ethical consumer. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Fridell, G. (2007). Fair trade coffee. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Keinert, C. (2008). Corporate social responsibility as an international strategy. Heidelberg: Physica-Verlag.
Lewis, T. and Potter, E. (2011). Ethical consumption. Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
Appendix-A
Option Survey
Are the current Products of McDonalds related to the Ethical Consumerism Stance in terms of Quality?
Are McDonalds are concentrated towards the orientation of their consumers in terms of health management issues?
What else are required by McDonalds to enhance the level of their Ethical Consumerism?
Appendix-B
i)
ii)
iii)