Month: September 2010

Today while flipping through the Business section in the Vancouver Sun, I found an article about a pizza restaurant using a new eco-friendly pizza box.

This Victoria pizza store, Ali Baba Pizza, is the first restuarant to use them. Produced by the company, Green Box, the pizza box is made from recycled cardboard. ” The top of the box breaks down into plates while the bottom folds into a convenient storage container for left overs,” as described in the Vancouver Sun.

 This was designed to eliminate the amount of boxes and disposable plates used by pizza restuarants. During class, we have explored on the issues of social responsiblity and the effects it has on a company.

I would say that Ali Baba Pizza has taken a step towards being social responsible. A company not only has to be responsible to give back returns to their shareholders, they also need to be responsible to the community and be aware of issues that have arisen recently. Ali-Baba is moving towards sustainability, which I believe would most definitely attract eco-friendly customers to purchase pizzas from Ali-Baba.

Source: “Restaurateur adopts ‘pizza box of 21st century’ from Vancouver Sun September 22, 2010

Communication is key for a company to be successful. But what happens when communication is tainted with the omission of information?

Enron, a company created from the merging of Houston Natrual Gas and Omaha-based Inter North, is a prime example of communication meets social responsiblity. Kenneth Lay, the CEO of Enron brought the company into new fields, experiencing a substantial growth of revenue.

However, the company was engaging in risk activiities. And by this time, the company was suffering from the lack of profits. Instead of communicating this with the public, Jefferey Skilling assured the investors and stockholders that they were making huge profits. Enron reported false profits to the public, wronging the investor sand stockholders’ trust and support. 

As the company’s situation worsened, the truth was exposed to the public. As a result of this scandal, millions of dollars were lost, and many lives were ruined.

Enron failed to assume their responsiblity of ethically using the money entrusted to them by the investors and stockholders. Communication is key to the success of a business; however, manipulative communication is not only harmful but also unethical. And thus, social responsibility applies to all parts of a business.

Source:http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/enron/

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