Establishing a social responsible business environment has become obligation for most organizations rather than being used as a marketing strategy. This is as a result of growing stakeholders’ needs and expectations that prompts organizations to operate their businesses while observing ethical values and benefits that their operations has to the stakeholders. Being a global organization, Starbucks actively observes corporate social responsibility actions to all the stakeholders by ensuring that their operations creates a positive impacts on the stakeholders who include the employees, consumers, suppliers, environment and the community, shareholders and the government. Starbuck’s CSR strategy relies on three main pillars including the community, environment, and ethical outsourcing. This article provides a detailed summary of how Starbucks has implemented their corporate social responsibility practices to the two major stakeholders; consumers and the environment. The paper also analyzes the ethical practices of Starbucks and highlights some of the measures that the company could implement to improve the current CSR practices.
With the increased global concerns on the issue of environmental degradations, many organizations including Starbucks have made it their responsibility to adopt practices that promote environmental sustainability. Starbucks has adopted several measures in ensuring that their business operations are environmentally friendly in addition to ensuring that the process used to produce the raw materials is environmentally sustainable. This is achieved by purchasing raw materials which include coffee, cocoa and tea which is grown in a hundred percent responsible manner by use farming methods that are highly organic and maintain high levels of biodiversity. As a way of encouraging sustainable farming methods, over ninety percent of the raw materials supplied to the company are those certified by the Starbucks Coffee and Farmer Equity (CAFÉ).
Another method that Starbucks has implemented corporate social responsibility towards environmental improvement is their strategy of ‘going green’ through upgrading their stores into more environmentally sustainable. The first effort of implementing the strategy took place when the organization renovated their store in Manhattan by replacing old fixtures with new equipment that conserves energy and reduces waste. The new equipment has become successful in conserving energy, materials and reducing water consumption in addition to adopting the use of reusable and recyclable materials such as cups and wrapping papers. As Werther and Chandler (2010) states, most organizations are afraid to install energy and waste efficient equipment due to the involved initial costs, without understanding the fact that the long term impacts are more beneficial both to the organization, community, and the environment. This one of the risk that Starbucks has undertaken to promote environment sustainability as the company aims at renovating more of its store to adopt the use of energy efficient equipment.
In addition to promoting environmental sustainability, Starbucks’ corporate social responsibility is portrayed by the way they treat customers’ needs and demands. The products and services offered to the customers portray high sense of responsibility, customer oriented and quality and this has made Starbucks gain a reputable brand image both locally and in the global market. Carrying out research to understand customer demographics have enabled the company to be socially responsible through adjusting their equipment to accommodate customers with different physical needs especially people with disability. This is implemented by remodeling the stores to accommodate the needs of the customers with a disability such as lower the height of the counters, adding, at least, one entrance that facilitates the needs of disabled persons and providing constant training to the employees concerning the need to provide equal services to all the customers.
Promoting the health of the customers is another corporate social responsibility that Starbucks exercises. As a result of changing consumer needs, tastes and preferences whereby consumers are becoming more health-conscious, Starbucks has made it their responsibility to provide healthier drinks with low calorie content while retaining the original flavors. Some of the products that are health conscious include the ‘skinny’ version of almost all the drinks that have less than half the calories as compared to the original drinks. Providing quality customer service is the main social responsibility that has gained a positive reputation that has created a wide customer base for Starbucks (Liu and Liu, 2009). This is coupled with the customers’ royalty program whereby the company rewards the customers by giving them promotional meals depending on the number of points accumulated in the membership royalty card.
Ethical practices have enabled Starbucks to establish a responsible business environment and demonstrate their corporate social responsibility to the stakeholders. This is despite the fact that the costs involved are relatively high for instance installing energy efficient equipment and purchasing certified coffee only. In addition, working with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that lobby for consumer and environment protection has helped Starbucks to transform its corporate culture to create a business environment that is socially and ethically responsible. Despite the success, Starbucks needs to improve in pricing their products whereby customers complain that the products are relatively higher than the competitors. The company also needs to provide constant training especially to the new employees on the disability etiquette as a way f retaining the corporate social responsibility to the consumers and the community in particular.
References
Liu, S. & Liu, L. (2009). Implementing corporate external social responsibility strategies through organizational design and operation. Journal of International Business Ethics, Vol. 2(1), 79-83,119.
Werther, W. B., & Chandler, D. (2010). Strategic corporate social responsibility: Stakeholders in a global environment. NY: Sage Publications.
