Chipotle Corporate Social Responsibility

In Aug 2012, a Toronto Maple Leaf Foods (“the Company”) plant was confirmed as being involved in the outbreak of the food-borne illness, caused by the bacterium Listeria. A day later, Maple Leaf upgraded a precautionary recall of 23 of its products in previous week to all 220 packaged meats from the plant at the Bartor’s Road, which has been shut down. The company has estimated the recall will directly cost it at least $20 million, with further costs expected due to lost sales and reputation damage. Since the outbreak of Listeria bacterium, 22 people died and there were 57 total confirmed cases of illness caused by Listeria 1. Although the Listeria outbreak was described by the Company’s CEO as “the

Our College of Science Committee is planning on having a Chipotle fundraiser on Wednesday, November 30th from 4-8pm at the Chipotle at 1516 N Naper Blvd #104, Naperville, IL 60563.

This paper explores the mission, vision, values and principles of Chipotle Mexican Grill that guide them in the restaurant industry. Their key mission, vision, and values revolve around providing food with integrity and changing the way people think about and eat fast food. Chipotle’s principles include sticking to the basics of a simple menu and uncomplicated, interactive employee roles.

When an organization partakes in “proactive behavior…for the benefit of society,” it is deemed as socially responsible (P. 155). However, prior to labeling a organization as socially responsible, it is important that we first identify what specific elements of proactive behavior constitute a socially responsible business. To begin, for an organization to be considered socially responsible on the highest level, it must take a proactive approach to doing business. This is defined as “[taking a] approach to social responsibility in which an organization goes beyond industry norms to solve and prevent problems” (P.155). In addition, it is standard for a socially responsible organization to incorporate a larger scope of stakeholders, to include external stakeholders, in their business decisions to create positive externalities, and mitigate negative ones, to benefit society as a whole.

Whole Foods has the Philanthropic Responsibility on Carroll’s global social responsibility pyramid, mainly for their involvement in educating employees, and customers on the importance of lifestyle changes in eating more organic, healthy foods. Moreover, Whole Foods involvement in volunteer work through the communities they serve; however,

With sales of over thirty billion back in 2014, Publix is an American supermarket that has been listed on the top ten American’s largest private companies by Forbes in 2010. It is also the fourteenth largest retailer in America. Publix is privately owned and operated by its 176,500 employees, with its main base in Florida. However, “Publix has 1,103 stores in Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, South Carolina and North Carolina” (Publix Funding) as well. Publix super markets are always trying to be more sustainable and environmentally friendly. For example, they create recycling programs, make sustainable choices of where food is purchased, use reusable grocery bags instead of plastic bags, and so much more. In addition to being more sustainable, they partner with many charities, including: Feeding America Foundation, United Way, and Greenville Habitat. These are just a few of the forty affiliates that Publix has connected with.

In the chipotle article it states that many of their restaurants were being just down by the Food and Drug Administration in almost 9 states. The reason why so many were closing was because of viruses spreading which were E. Coli and the norovirus. The they are still investigating if they would have criminal charges or not.

Steve Ells is the founder and CEO of Chipotle. Steve is a trained chef and opened his first Chipotle store in 1993 at a former Dolly Madison ice cream store in Denver, Colorado. His goal was to serve high quality, delicious food quickly and in a “fast-casual” setting (Ells).

CMO Mark Crumpacker stated, fast-food marketing typically is a game of trying to obscure the truth; The more people know about fast-food, the less interest they’d want to be a customer. Chipotle’s mission statement “Food with Integrity” reflects its focus on fresh ingredients; great food with a socially responsible message made them one of the first organic oriented fast-food restaurant

Management is the backbone of any good company. In order for a company to successful, a strong management team is needed in order to meet goals in an effective and efficient manner. Chipotle opened its doors in 1993 when Steve Ells took a chance and began his business in San Francisco. Chipotle is a chain of Mexican restaurants that is based in Denver. Chipotle is often cited as the company that started the fast casual movement where customers can get a healthy prepared meal quicker than other traditional styled restaurant. The fast casual restaurant concept was well received and Chipotle’s popularity expanded all across the United States. Customers could not get enough of the Mexican chain and massive lines could be seen stretching outside the stores all across the country. Along with its popular food, Chipotle Mexican Style Grill is a company that contains a successful management style. Why? What sets this companies management apart from the rest? There are many factors that we could analyze to understand the success of Chipotle, yet for the purpose of this paper, we will look into the cooperate culture of the company, human resource management, their leadership style, and how Chipotle deals with and how the company manages in times of crisis.

Chipotle is facing numerous challenges due to the fact that E. coli outbreak which requires the corporation from the key stakeholders to keep it under control and apply the new food safety protocols which can aid to bring the regular customers back. Although the main cause remains a mystery, Chipotle’s E. coli outbreak has been authoritatively declared officially over by the experts. However, since the poisoning outbreak, the impact of the reduced number of customers affects the profit which the company used to enjoy before such eventuality (Scholes 27).

In business, Anne Lawrence and James Weber (2014) identify enlightened self-interest as a corporation’s recognition that using corporate resource to serve others, including customers, employees, and the community as a whole, is in the best interest of the company. This social responsibility enhances the company’s image within the community, which increases both customer loyalty and satisfaction of employees. Some of the ways that businesses serve others is through philanthropy and backing environmental sustainability. Within his lecture on ethics and corporate responsibility, Dr. Kahlib Fischer (n.d.) encourages the importance of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in that it provides mutual benefit to both the organization and the community.

Fast food company’s pride themselves on making orders and food in a timely fashion as well as providing high quality food and an atmosphere for all, but what happens when a huge crisis happens and it ends in lawsuits. In this article, I will discuss Taco Bell’s 2006 E. coli crisis and how it came to be a crisis for the company. Next I will discuss some of the actions Taco Bell took to manage the crisis once it escalated and how the company approached to handle the crisis. In other words, did they do it great or poorly. Lastly, I will discuss how certain theories relate to this E. coli disaster that affected dozens of people and hurt business.

When you are feeling down in the dumps, you have two options. Option A: go to the doctor to get an antibiotic to help you feel better, or Option B: just stick it out, feel terrible for an extended amount of time, and infect some other people with the same sickness along the way. Since the late 1800’s, most people have been choosing option A. In today’s society, most people don't think twice about having an antibiotic prescribed to them. Unfortunately, though, many activists challenge this theory and falsely accuse agriculturalists for infecting the food chain with antibiotics and hormones.

As stated by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy under Business Ethics, a business is a productive entity that provides goods and services for sale (Moriarty). “Business ethics can thus be understood as the study of the ethical dimensions of productive organizations and commercial activities. This includes ethical analyses of the production, distribution, marketing, sale, and consumption of goods and services” (Moriarty 1). In short, the idea of ethics can be described as morality, believing what is right and what is wrong morally. Big challenges fast food chains like the restaurant Chipotle Mexican Grill face in terms of ethics are requiring food safety, providing a safe environment for customers, giving the staff fair wages and secure working conditions. Ethics in business are important to the owners of restaurants such as the fast food chain Chipotle, owners of these fast food locations decide the difference between providing quality goods and maximizing profits. Figuring the efficiency of income comes to questioning if these actions are detrimental to the consumer.