Introduction
Starbucks is a coffee company that roasts, brands, and retails coffee all over the world. The company has been concerned with its corporate social responsibility, as this affects the communities where it operates and other stakeholders as well. Starbucks management encourages all employees to conduct business in a way that will produce economic, social, and environmental benefits to all stakeholders. The company is unique in the way it offers benefits to its employees. This helps motivate the employees who work to help achieve the overall goal of the company. The rapid growth of Starbucks Coffee Company can be attributed to the ethical and socially responsible activities that it has carried out.
Starbucks and its Social Responsibility
Starbucks is greatly concerned with social responsibility in its overall corporate strategy. This is because social responsibility attracts and retains the company’s partners (Ferrell, Fraedrich, and Ferrell, 2009, p.443). Being socially responsible to partners increases their satisfaction and eventually, enhances the strength of relationships with the partners. This is likely to attract other partners to do business with the company. The company has been able to meet the demands of the customers in terms of products and services. Having met all the buying criteria of the customers, being socially responsible will increase the customers’ loyalty to the company. Being socially responsible would also reduce operating costs. The company invests a lot of money in buying efficient equipment. These machines help in preserving the environment and saving some costs in that the future costs that could have been incurred as a result of the use of inefficient equipment will not be incurred. A socially responsible company is also able to sustain the business in achieving the needs of the customers. Suppliers have to be socially responsible so that customers will always have the products every time they need them. The company also knows that being socially responsible will help it acquire licenses to operate in local communities.
Unique Benefits to Starbucks Employees
Starbucks employees enjoy high-level benefits that employees in many other companies do not enjoy. All employees of the company receive full healthcare benefits that include medical, dental, vision, and alternative services (Ferrell, Fraedrich, and Ferrell, 2009, p.446). These benefits are also given to part-timers who work for at least twenty-four hours per quarter of a calendar. Employment assistance programs (EAP) are available to all employees of the company. The company has a stock investment program that allows employees to buy shares at the company at an eighty percent discount. The employees’ contributions to the future of the company are also matched depending on the length of time that the employee has been in service. The employees receive twenty-five to one hundred and fifty percent of the first four percent of pay.
Starbucks’ Growth
For the many years that Starbucks Coffee Company has been in operation, it has carried out its activities in an ethical and socially responsible manner. This has made great contributions to the overall growth of the company. To help in maintaining the environment which the company could have destructed, the company in 1999 started to offer leftover coffee grounds to farmers for composting. The coffee grounds can be used to increase the fertility of gardens. Instead of leaving them to pollute the environment, the company decided to offer them free to customers. This attracted individuals so that they could also receive the coffee grounds. Starbucks uses reusable cups for packing some of its coffee products. The company goes out collecting these cups and any customer is given a ten percent discount if he or she brings his or her reusable cup to the company. This has helped in maintaining the environment and attracting more customers (Ferrell, Fraedrich, and Ferrell, 2009, p.447). The company has recently been involved in fair trade especially in purchasing coffee. This has helped improve the lives of farmers because their coffee has been profitable. The company has also used fair trade in the sale of its products to its customers since 2009. This has helped it attract more customers and enter new markets. The company provides employees with training especially in coffee tasting, roasting, purchasing, and growing regions. This has helped increase the quality of products that the company offers to consumers. The company also has other programs that help in funding clean water projects in under-developed areas and supplying AIDS medicine in different areas. A combination of these ethical and socially responsible activities has helped the company achieve intense growth especially by attracting more customers.
Conclusion
Starbucks is the leading company in roasting, branding, and retailing coffee in the world. It has been greatly concerned with social responsibility in its overall corporate strategy because social responsibility helps it increase relationships with customers, win customer loyalty, sustain the business, and others. Employees to Starbucks enjoy high-level benefits that employees in other companies do not enjoy. The growth of Starbucks can be attributed to the ethical and socially responsible activities that the company has carried out.
Reference
Ferrell, O.C., Fraedrich, John, and Ferrell, Linda (2009). Business Ethics, Ethical Decision Making & Cases, (Seventh Edition). Boston, MA: Prentice Hall.