Ethics, Cyclones and Quakes

Cyclone in Myanmar. Quake in China. Many dead. Not good.

Here is an article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal titled, Does Being Ethical Pay? Companies Spend Huge Amounts Of Money To Be Socially Responsible. Do Consumers Reward Them For It? And How Much?.

The article reports a series of experiments that found that consumers will pay a small premium for ethically produced goods. But they will punish an unethically made product even more harshly by buying it only at a steep discount. These results are consistent with academic studies I have read on this topic.

In light of this devastation in Myanmar and China, what is your response to the following questions:

1. One way you can help brand your firm and do good at the same time, particularly if your firm does business in or with Asia, has Asian employees or clients or suppliers, any of which is highly likely given our locale in California, is reach out and show empathy by donating $$$ to victims in China and/or Myanmar. You could then in turn leverage this in other ways.

But who/what agency would you donate funds to to help these folks? Who is reliable? Who do you start with and how do you find this out? And do you donate in RMB or US dollars?

2. How would you broadcast your firm’s do-goodness in this regard, gently and humbly or other, to your various stakeholders so that they know you care and will remember you when they buy your product? What is your strategy?

No cop outs on the second question! That is, I would question your credibility and business savvy if you say, “Well, I am/my firm will be ‘above’ telling people about my firm’s good works and money donations to these regions in Asia. We won’t tell anyone about our do-goodness because that would be arrogant and will let our actions speak for us.” I don’t know one successful and profitable business run by people that took a marketing or strategy class that would take that approach to product or service differentiation, and be that selfless, particularly a public company that has to answer to shareholders about how they are spending their money.

Discuss.

By the way, here is a good blog from Chengdu, the mega-city in China that is 50 or so miles from the quake epicenter, Barking at the Sun. Said blog has some pretty good on-the-ground info re the quake and that region.

7 comments May 14th, 2008