Introduction The Dannon Company is a story of company that did not know what to do with itself. The company wanted to promote its corporate social responsibility (CSR), but did not know how or where to do so. Question arose on whether or not the company wanted to promote CSR communications. Dannon 's management team was at a precipice, but how should the company get across? Michael Neuwirth, senior director of public relations for Dannon, was considering what part the company 's CSR could act, if any, in the company 's advancement (Marquis et al, 2011). This paper 's intention is to analyze both the benefits and risks of communicating Dannon 's CSR to the public forum on a larger scale, as well as the role of the parent company, Danone. Additionally, this paper will suggest a communication strategy which, I would propose, would fall in line with the company 's vision and history of CSR. To Communicate or Not to Communicate? Dannon 's CSR focused on three aspects—nutrition and health, people, and nature (Marquis et al, 2011). Despite its efforts, Dannon was not known for its CSR directives. The company 's CSR history was mostly internal—not well known to consumers—and a stark contrast to the company 's major competitor Yoplait, celebrated for its annual “Save Lids to Save Lives” campaign (Marquis et al, 2011). Contemplating on the direction Dannon should take, if any, Neuwrith sought council from company stakeholders (Marquis et al, 2011). The responses
The purpose of this essay is to research the notion of CSR and uncover its true framework and outline what social responsibility truly means to corporate organisations, and whether it should be seriously considered to be a legitimate addition to the corporate framework of an organisation.
Moreover, the growing number of conscience consumers was highlighted in a recent Bursen-Marsteller report; “people will more likely choose a product that supports a social cause when choosing between otherwise similar products” (Penn, Schoen & Berland, 2010). These average consumers daily decisions are slowly but surely being influenced by social concern and responsibility. Finally, the critical issue for Company Q is the social responsibility to its customers, who looks to business to provide them with satisfying, safe products and respect their rights as customer.
Stakeholders will generally detect duplicity in CSR motives; intrinsic or genuine motives as well as extrinsic profit-related motives; however, stakeholders will be tolerant of clear extrinsic motives, if the CSR initiatives are rooted in intrinsic values. This leads to the perceived “win-win” scenario, and is one of the driving factors behind company CSR initiatives, as they realize the value of helping society while still being able to focus on the impact to the bottom line (Tonello, 2011). In addition, if campaigns are not communicated specifically around the brands it produces, then a “halo effect” for the entire industry could be the end result, of a poorly executed communication strategy (Marquis et al., 2011) Therefore, it is important for Dannon to construct a carefully balanced communication strategy, which considers the perception of its stakeholders in the marketplace, while also ensuring to highlight the specific impact of its CSR initiatives within the communities it operates.
1. Even though Dannon has been partaking in CSR for quite some time it has always been done internally rather than externally. Because of this, consumers are unaware of the Dannon Institute, which has been active in researching and educating about healthy eating. If Dannon communicated this to its audience it could enlighten people on the benefits of healthy eating and how yogurt could be a healthy staple to people’s diet. This could potentially cause more people to purchase yogurt and also cause current yogurt buyers to purchase more frequent. The negative to this is that these CSR efforts could be seen as a copy-cat to Yoplait. People may not believe the findings, as they could think these findings are just a sales pitch to get them to believe that
Answer: Dannon should not communicate its CSR activities to the public. Dannon and Yoplait are the two leading company in US with Yoplait have 35.4% market share and Dannon is second with 28.9% market share. Dannon is not too far behind Yoplait and so they don’t need to do much to become the number 1 player in America. Also, the consumers can gather more knowledge about the CSR activities of Dannon through the Dannon cares section on the website and the 16- page
While Arosio, Pollock, Sargent, and Binney were able to point out both the positive and negative sides of communicating the company’s CSR efforts, Jove, Vice President of Marketing, and Cicio, Vice president of Human Resources, did not have any reservations in voicing out the true risks of the idea. According to Jove, since the U.S. population is still an emerging market for yogurt, the timing for communicating Dannon’s CSR as a marketing message would be premature. He knew very well that the current challenge is to get the American consumers to “want yogurt first” before making them “want Dannon”. Jove quoted, “I cannot put the chariot in front of the horse. First is product. Then we can enrich it with community and social activities.” (Marquis et al., 2011, p.11). Alongside Jove opposition to the idea, Cicio’s main concerns communicated its potential “moral dilemma”. He reminded Neuwirth of the bold conflict that the idea can bring by mixing CSR concepts as a marketing effort and
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is something that affects all companies and should be an active factor in the company’s decision making. It is something all corporations need to care about. CSR is when business’ or corporations take part in an initiative or campaign for a cause that will benefit society and/or in some way make the world a better place (Taylor, 2015). Initially, Corporate Social Responsibility started to take shape around the 1950’s, but some say that it dates all the way back to the 1800s, the idea of CSR was seen (Carroll, 2007). One may think that because it is dated so long ago, it doesn’t have an important impact today nevertheless, it is proven that Corporate Social Responsibility is a pathway for entities to self benefit as they are in the process of benefitting society.
In this article, “The Truth About CSR,” authors Rangan, Chase and Karim stress the importance in aligning a company’s social and environmental activities with its business purpose and values (Rangan, Chase, & Karim, 2015, 41). Outcomes of CSR programs should be a “spillover” and not a primary focus of a business, expressing concern towards social responsibility and corporations failing to contribute to society accordingly (Rangan, Chase, Karim, 2015, 42). There is a great deal of importance in companies refocusing their CSR activities on a primary goal and in providing an organized process for bringing consistency and discipline to CSR strategies (42). Rangan, Chase and Karim want corporations to understand why it is important for them to evaluate their CSR activities and refocus them towards the goal of reinforcing the firm’s societal and environmental actions, while also ensuring their actions add to the overall purpose and values of the corporation. According to the authors, even though
Dannon following the Corporate Social Responsibility program will help blend products naturally and the message will be consistent which will increase confidence in Dannon products. The risk with corporate and local level Corporate Social Responsibility communication program is measurability, impact and calculation of return of investment. Corporate Social Responsibility communication does have a positive impact and provides intangible benefits. During the communication campaign, there will be a short-term impact other than few products such as Activia. Depending on the individual Corporate Social Responsibility communication, competitor may take advantage or gain, if the consumer were to confuse about which company's Corporate Social Responsibility initiative. Critics could analyze Corporate Social Responsibility communication and demand is doing more, which will leave Dannon in a defensive position generating disinterest by its consumers (Marquis, Pooja, Tolleson, & Thomason, 2011, p.
Current approaches to CSR are fragmented and/or disconnected from business goals. Many firms still consider CSR as another generic public relations problem in which media campaigns and CSR reports are used to paint the company as a positive ethical, social and or environmental advocator and supporter. For example, the annual reports discuss a firm’s sensitivities to CSR issues, but completely lack the entire story and offer no further forward commitments from the firm. Further, the ratings and rankings measurements are self-appointed by the firm, not always accurate to validate the work and direct impact to what they are measuring, and the criteria base varies widely and weighed differently in the final scoring. Worst of all the data lacks impartial auditors for validating the data to ensure the ratings have been accurately met, and data is statistically significant and a good proxy for what it is supposed to reflect. This has resulted in reactive initiatives designed to appease vocal
Corporate social responsibility has been one the key business buzz words of the 21st century. Consumers' discontent with the corporation has forced it to try and rectify its negative image by associating its name with good deeds. Social responsibility has become one of the corporation's most pressing issues, each company striving to outdo the next with its philanthropic image. People feel that the corporation has done great harm to both the environment and to society and that with all of its wealth and power, it should be leading the fight to save the Earth, to combat poverty and illness and etc. "Corporations are now expected to deliver the good, not just the goods; to pursue
THE CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY (CSR) MOVEMENT has grown in recent years from a fringe activity by a few earnest companies, like The Body Shop, and Ben & Jerry’s, to a highly visible priority for
Dr. Veleva’s 2010 case study, “New Balance: Developing an integrated CSR strategy”, examines the company’s history and corporate culture, and describes how in 2006 it started to approach CSR more formally, creating a CSR steering committee. In 2008, the company engaged the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship (BCCCC) to help develop a framework, conduct
This is essay will focus on analyzing how corporate social responsibility (CSR) influences the investor relations of a corporation and whether it is good for the society, using Gasland and FrackNation as examples. In the contemporary society, CSR sounds like a commendatory term for the society. Over decades, it seems like that both the public and the media are trying to encourage corporations to behave more responsibly, and corporations are gradually becoming more socially aware in the contemporary society because they know they cannot afford the consequence of ignoring it. (Bernstein, 2009:606) However, CSR is not always beneficial. One of the major practices of public relations is investor relations, because the concerns of a corporation’s investors can directly relate to its welfare. When the corporations paid more attention on CSR, their investors will inevitably somehow feel ignored. As a public which has real material input to the corporations, investors are seeking for future returns, they want to be treated specially by the corporations that they invest. Also, value too much about CSR can make corporations become the victim of being morally hijacked, which may harm both a corporation’s financial success and the whole society’s harmony.
Therefore, corporate’ activities have strong influences to the stakeholders. Hildebrand,D,et,al (2011) argued that under a specific but identifiable situation, a company’s CSR actions are able to satisfy stakeholders’ higher-order and self-related demand, meanwhile enabling the stakeholders to identify with the company. On the other hand, Piercy, N. and Lane, N.(2009) indicated that CSR seems to be the most efficient way for the corporate marketing efforts of most firms. It may enable the stakeholders to be loyal even life-long customers of the companies.