You are on page 1of 9

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

Annexure-V-CoverPagefor Academic Tasks


CourseCode: MGN 253
CourseTitle: Business
Ethics
Course Instructor:
Academic Task No.: 2
Coca Cola company
Date ofAllotment: 20/9/2015
10/10/2015
Students Rollno:

Academic Task Title:


Date ofsubmission:
25 Studen ts Reg. no:

LearningOutcomes:
Declaration:
I declare that this Assignment is my individual work. I have not
copied it from any other students work or from any other source
except where due acknowledgement is made explicitly in the text,
nor has any part been written form by any other person.
Student signature:
Evaluatorscomments(For Instructors use only)
GeneralObservations
Bestpartofassignment

Suggestionsfor Improvement

EvaluatorsSignatureandDate:
Marks Obtained:

Max.Marks:

Page 1

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

Coca Cola Company


Contents
Introduction of Company
Ethical and Unethical practices
Applying Theoretical Concepts
Recommendation
Conclusion
References

Page 2

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

Introduction

In May 1886, John Pemberton, who was a pharmacist from Atlanta,


Georgia, was the first founder of coca cola. He concocted the coca cola
formula in kin three legged brass kettle which the suggestion was given
by bookkeeper Frank Robinson. Coke was first sold at the pharmacy as a
non alcoholic version of French wine coca. Is an American multinational
beverage corporation and manufacturer, retailer and marketer of nonalcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups, which is headquartered in
Atlanta, Georgia. The company is best known for its flagship product Cola.
The Coca-Cola formula and brand was bought in 1889 by As a Griggs
Candler (December 30, 1851 - March 12, 1929), who incorporated The
Coca-Cola Company in 1892.
With production facilities in over 200 countries in the world
To put this in perspective, another American icon, McDonalds has
locations in only 119 countries2. As one of the worlds best-known brands,
coca- cola has capitalized on opportunities and Thrived. However, the
process has not been without some upheavals.
When Roberto Goizueta, its CEO for 17 years, passed away on October
18.1997, after a short bout with Lung cancer, the future looked uncertain.
During Goizueta, s tenure at coca- cola, the market value of the company
had dramatically increased from $4 billon to nearly $150 billon.
Coca-Colas Global Dominance The larger a company is, the harder it is to
continue to grow at a steady pace. This remains the major challenge
facing the Coca-Cola Company .The U.S market is already well developed,
with an average consumption per person of one serving per day of coke
products in both 2001 and 2002,The European and Eurasian market grew
slightly from 2001 to 2002 , with average consumption increasing from
one and a half to two serving per week. The Latin American, Asian and
African markets consumption levels were unchanged from 2001 to 2002
at four serving per week, two servings per month and three servings per
month, respectively4. Coca-cola produces more than 300 brands
worldwide in addition to its flagship brands, coke and diet coke.

Page 3

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

Unethical practices of coca cola

Coca-Cola Company has been sued by many different people and for
several different reasons Coca-cola. In the early 20th Century, was
prosecuted for the unethical and illegal actions of combining drugs with
their product to create an addicting force between the product and the
consumers. Coca-Cola Companys idea of creating customer loyalty was
aimed more at addicting the customer to the product over developing a
relationship between the customer and the company. The unethical
behaviour of the company was not to cross the line with serious legal
issues of this calibre and moved onto substituting caffeine for cocaine. In
October 2006, Coca-Cola Company was sued for an insufficient label. The
lawsuit claimed that since the label was insufficient, the labels were
misleading the consumers. This can be easily classified as unethical
behaviour by the company and can be seen as morally wrong. The
company is essentially trying to profit from the misconception and
misguidance of the marketing for the product. During late July 2001,
Coca-Cola was threatened by a major lawsuit that involved the company
violating human rights that caused five hundred employees at Coca-Cola
plants in Columbia harm or death.
Kala Dera is Thirsting from Coca-Cola. Kala Dera large village outside
the city of Jaipur where agriculture is the primary source of
livelihood. Coca-Cola started its bottling operations in Kala Dera in
2000, and within a year, the community started to notice a rapid
decline in groundwater levels.
Page 4

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

For
farmers,
loss
of
groundwater translated directly
into loss of income. For
women, it meant having to
walk additional 5 to 6 kilometres just to fetch water to meet the basic
daily needs of the family.
Forced Assessment Validates Community Concerns
The community of Kala Dera are opposing Coca-Cola bottling plants,
but they have enjoyed significant international support. And most
notable in lending support have been college and university students
across the globe, and in particular, the US, UK and Canada - some of
Coca-Cola's larger markets.
Stop Using Groundwater in Kala Dera
Confirming that Coca-Cola's bottling plant in Kala Dera operated in
an "overexploited" groundwater area and the Coca-Cola's bottling
plant had "significant impacts", the assessment noted that "the
plant's operations in this area would continue to be one of the
contributors to a worsening water situation and a source of stress to
the communities around.

Applying Theoretical concepts


Sustainability
our business strategy and core values recognise the critical importance of
creating shared value for employees, consumers, customers and
communities. Over the last decade, we have integrated corporate
responsibility and sustainability into the way we run our business. We
identified the material issues to our business and our stakeholders and
established strategies and commitments along with vigorous governance.
Sustainability is clearly part of how we do business. As we continue to
embed sustainability in our second decade, our sustainability programmes
are long-term investments aiming to build value over time for our
business and communities. Consumer health and wellness is a key issue
for our business and our communities, but we also continue to focus on
minimising our environmental impacts, developing sustainability in our
value chain and creating value for our communities.
Priority Areas
Page 5

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

Women: economic empowerment and entrepreneurship

Water: access to clean water, water conservation and recycling

Well-Being: active healthy living, education and youth


development

In addition, the Foundation supports many local community programs


such as arts and culture, community and economic development
programs in the United States, as well as HIV/AIDS prevention and
awareness programs in Africa and Latin America.
Our community commitment is shared across The Coca-Cola system.
When natural disasters strike, The Coca-Cola Foundation and the
entire Coca-Cola system respond to offer emergency relief. Through
the Coca-Cola Matching Gifts Program, eligible employees make personal
contributions to qualified organizations and TheCoca-Cola Foundation
matches those contributions on a 2-for-1 basis.
Health and wellness
As all of our products can be part of an active, healthy lifestyle that
includes a balanced diet and regular physical activity, we respond to the
consumer needs for a greater choice of diet, light and zero-calorie
beverages. Obesity has turned into a significant threat for health and is
primarily the result of energy imbalance; the most effective way to
manage body weight is to balance the amount of energy (calories)
consumed with the amount expended through physical activity and
healthy living. Environment
Minimising our environmental impact is a core target for us. All of our
businesses are charged with seeking new ways to decrease use of water
and energy and to reduce waste. Since 2004, we have set annual
improvement targets and we are working towards our ambitious 2020
goals. Water and environment
Water is a major focus of our environmental programmes. It is an essential
ingredient in our products and has an important function in the
manufacturing process.
We understand that protection of water resources will not only help in
maintaining our status as one of the world's leading bottlers of nonPage 6

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

alcoholic beverages in a manageable way, but also assist in supporting


the sustainable development of the communities we serve.
Community
We are an active member of the community in each of the 28 countries in
which we operate.
We aim to operate in a responsible way by engaging with stakeholders
and communities to for their sustainable development. Over the last
decade we have integrated corporate responsibility and sustainability into
our business, as our mission requires us to improve the quality of life and
invest in local communities.
Through our core business activities, which generate income for
employees, supplier payments and government taxes, our focus remains
to invest in community partnerships and projects regarding environmental
and social issues.
In 2014, we contributed more than 8.7 million -representing 2.5% of our
pre-tax profit- to socially responsible programmes.
10 marks for examining and
critically evaluatingthe situation

Recommendation:
Instead of putting out unethical advertisements, companies should
familiarize themselves with ethical frameworks. Avoiding unethical
advertisements will foster a good corporate reputation, which is beneficial
as it enhances the company's culture and morale, increases sales, helps
launch new products and services, increases awareness among publics of
importance, and creates a climate of good will towards the organization. I
feel that the biggest issue for marketing companies (and all companies in
general) is the gap between the managers ethics and the ethics of their
audience. This is known as the societal expectations/ethical reality gap.
This gap is created when society requires better ethical conduct from
marketers than they are providing. To do this, managers must be
educated on their companys code of ethics and the value of ethics in
their organization. CEOs must also hire managers that have a moral
compass and who they can trust with the reputation of their business.
Managers should possess Rest's 4 Elements of Ethical Action . The first is
moral sensitivity (recognition); being able to interpret that there is an
ethical problem at hand. Second is moral judgment: deciding which course
of action is morally right. Third is moral motivation: prioritizing moral
values over other values. The final value is moral character: executing and
implementing the moral intention despite obstacles. Showing managers
that ethics are a crucial part of being a strong company will help to ensure
that managers make ethically sound decisions. When determining
Page 7

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

whether or not an advertisement is ethical or a decision surrounding the


release of an advertisement, I suggest using Garretts Proportionality
Framework as it is 11 applicable to most situations and is easy to
understand. An ethical framework is a general set of guidelines that can be
applied to many different situations when dealing with an ethical dilemma.

Conclusion:
The coca cola company is currently one of the biggest and most
recognized soft beverage brands in the world.
With over 3000 products and more than 200 countries, the coca,
Cola Company has surely part of peoples lives.
The coca cola company owes its success to the people who do their
best to achieve the task in hand .thus, the coca- cola company takes
cares of its
employees to return a creating a good working
environment and working along with union and government and
agencies to make sure its employees are safe.
Coca Cola has spent over $2 million just on advertising and
marketing. This makes Coca-Cola well known in many countries In
addition, keeping up with today's new trends, the Coca-Cola
Company also advertise its products on MySpace, face book and
twitter.
The Coca-Cola Company has been able to the set the entry barrier in
the beverage business very high, new companies are discouraged to
compete with Coca-Cola. It is almost impossible for new comers to
keep up with Coca-Cola and similar competitors with recognized
names in the business such as Pepsi.
The Coca-Cola success isn't something that has been achieved over
night. Many years has passed since John Pemberton created the
secret formula for Coca-Cola in 1886.
It is almost impossible for new comers to keep up with Coca-Cola
and similar competitors with recognized names in the business such
as Pepsi.
. It is almost impossible for new comers to keep up with Coca-Cola
and similar competitors with recognized names in the business such
as Pepsi. The Coca-Cola success isn't something that has been
achieved over night. Many years has passed since John Pemberton
created the secret formula for Coca-Cola in 1886.

References
1.

https://www.google.co.in/search?
q=coca+cola+unethical+behavior&oq=unethical+practices+in+co
Page 8

Coca cola

Business
Ethics 2nd Assignment

ca+cola+company&gs_l=serp.1.1.0i71l4.0.0.0.269914.0.0.0.0.0.0.0
.0..0.0. Msedr...0...1c...64. Serp...0.0.0.tyK8y55dp9Q
2.

http://coca-cola081.blogspot.in/2010/09/unethical-behaviorcoca-cola-week-4.html

3.

Jump up to:a http://media.corporateir.net/media_files/irol/11/117435/CCE_2011AR_FINAL_LR.pdf

4.

Jump up^ "Schweppes Drinks: Ingredients and Nutritional


Information - Coca-Cola GB". Coca-cola.co.uk. 2010-04-13.
Retrieved 2013-10-26.

5.

Jump up^ A $417.5 MILLION OFFER BY COCA-COLA FOR


BOTTLER

6.

Jump up^ Coca-Cola to Pay 1 Billion for Bottling Plants in US


and Canada

7.

Jump up^ Financial Times "Coca-Cola has tended to keep its


bottlers at arms length"

8.

Jump up^ Coca-Cola Enterprises homepage "The World's


Largest Bottler"

9.

Jump up^ Coca-Cola Enterprises Launches Largest Hybrid


Electric Delivery Trucks in North America

10.

Jump up^ Coca-Cola Orders 120 New Hybrid Trucks; Eatons


Largest NA Commercial Order to Date.

Page 9

You might also like