Idea of what is Ethics
Ethics is all around the world whether it is showing respect to old and new customers of a business or figuring out how is I going to study for this test tomorrow? Today I are taking a look at ethics within two well known companies and how their different relationships with the people they encountered everyday and their very own employees. Business ethics defined as “a form of applied ethics that examines ethical problems and moral or ethical problems that arise in a business environment.” Another name for ethics is morality. How am I going to get customers to buy this product? Is it wrong to trick customers into buying a product that they don’t really need just to make a profit? This is just of the many questions corporations think about everyday as they sell and distribute their products to the public. All moral obligations are out the door, the business world is full of individuals who are liars, deceivers, and waiting to just take advantage of the average American. For businesses, money is money as long as they find a way to get you as the consumer to buy into their products they win. Businesses know that people will go above and beyond what they need to do to get what they want no matter how they get it. In this paper I will talk about two different companies whose strategies of making a profit are quite different. Moral philosophy to businesses is different than for the average human. For businesses they bend what is right and wrong to benefit them so that they can make a profit from us the consumer by getting us to go along with their ideas and purchase their products.
Ethics of Sales and Marketing
When thinking about companies and products with ethical standards, commercial marketing comes to my mind. How many times are commercials shown for a product that looks so good and appeasing that you end up going to the store and purchasing the product right after? Many times, it is surprising how a two minute advertising of a product could allow a person to feel as if he or she cannot live their lives without that particular product. This is quite the case for the Italian clothing company Benetton. Marketing is a powerful tool in trying to sell a product. It can manipulate the mind of any consumer to buying a product that otherwise they would not have bought in the right state of mind. Benetton is a very popular Italian clothing company that “has a network of 5,500 stores in 120 countries. The stores are managed by independent partners and generate a turnover of 2 billion Euros a year.” (“Benetton Group.” Wikipedia.com 20 March 2008. ) How is Benetton making most of its profit? Through its advertising and billboards worldwide, some may think that the advertising for such a global company would be carefree and entertaining playing with the strings of consumers to make them feel like they must purchase from the store to look as cool as the guy or girl model portrayed in the billboard. No, Benetton plays with consumers in a new way with advertising. Their commercials and billboards depict disturbing images that do not have anything to do with the clothing company itself to help promote their name. The company’s advertising would display images such as “such as a deathbed scene of a man dying from AIDS, a bloodied, unwashed newborn baby with umbilical cord still attached, two horses mating, close-up pictures of tattoos reading “HIV Positive” on the bodies of men and women, a collage consisting of genitals of persons of various races, a priest and nun about to engage in a romantic kiss, pictures of inmates on death row, and picture of bloodied, shot up pants and t-shirt of a soldier killed in Bosnian War.” (“Benetton Group.” Wikipedia.com 20 March 2008. ) Why would a global clothing company choose to promote their name with such gruesome and disturbing images because that’s what would get consumers into their product. As awful as it is, what Benetton is doing is a very smart business move. By tossing away the usual gorgeous models parading around their clothes in commercials and on poster just as any other clothing company in their category, Benetton decided what will get potential customers interested in buying their product or at least remember it. Flavio Briatoire had this to say about the advertising “We decided to do something very controversial that people would pick up on – 50% of people thought it was great and 50% thought it was awful, but in the mean time everyone was talking about Benetton.” (“Benetton Group.” Wikipedia.com 20 March 2008. ) Just as Briatoire said himself the goal was not for consumers to love the models and aspire to look like them in their clothes just as any other company but to instead be so distraught and confused that it makes people want to know more about the company and what it actually stands for because of its disturbing advertisements. The content of the advertising although immoral and disturbing gave the company the exact type of promotion it needed for people to begin talking and buying the product. What Benetton understands is that human beings will buy products not because like I mentioned before they necessarily need them but only because they want them. Whether it is because the product happens to be the latest trend or in Benetton case, the product turned out to be something that was unforgettable and its ads make it seem forbidden. Which us as human beings cannot resist the urge to buy products that seem like items we should not own and must purchase just simply because of the fact that the items seem like something that most people do not have. That is another issue with people; we always want to be ahead of each other in terms of getting the best cars, shoes, or even clothes. Looking better than one another so that we can stand out to be the individual or the one that everyone is following after, Benetton knew exactly this and with its racy advertisements have now achieved success as a company. Is Benetton doing anything wrong with their terrifying ads? Personally and profession I believe no because as a business they are required to figure out how to promote and sell their product to consumers the best way possible. Following the normal trend especially now in this recession economy is not going to make anyone rush out to stores and purchase new clothes. No, this company did exactly what they believe would 1.) Make their brand unforgettable and 2.) Get people interested in buying their items which is the most important thing. They reminded humans just how selfish we really are to buy the next best thing because it seems too dangerous for anyone to have. Whoever thought that an image of a bloodied baby would prompt someone to buy a shirt or pair jeans from a company?
