Chipotle
Mexican Grill: Norovirus outbreak in Virginia (2017)
Controversy
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| First Chipotle opened |
Chipotle
Mexican Grill opened their first restaurant in 1993. Their goal was to show
that food served fast didn’t have to be a “fast-food” experience. By combing
classic cooking techniques with high quality raw ingredients, and extraordinary
interior design, chipotle was able to bring together fine dining with quick
service restaurants. The founder of Chipotle is Steve Ells, he opened up the
first Chipotle near the University of Denver by using a loan of 85,000 from his
father. Steve and his father figured
that in order to be profitable the restaurant must sell at least 107 burritos a
day. Originally Ells planned on using funds from chipotle to open up a fine
dining restaurant. After the first month Chipotle was selling more than 1,000
burritos a day. With success coming from Chipotle Ells no longer had the plan
of opening up a new restaurant. Chipotle
currently has 2,408 restaurants and an average restaurant sale of 1.94 million.
But Chipotle success hasn’t always been smooth sailing. In 2015 the chain
restaurant had become involved in a problem were there was a spread of several
different food related diseases that infected hundreds of customers in about a
dozen states. The diseases that were being spread included E. coli, salmonella
and noroviruses. The spread of these diseases and the constant bad publicity,
had drove chipotle customers right out the door. The stock price before the
incident was around $750, after this issue it was around $354. Things got so
bad that stores were being shut down. Chipotle had recognized their mistakes
and revaluated themselves and did what they needed to do in order to resolve
this issue. After a while chipotle was able to get back on its feet and slowly
making its way back to how things were when they were the top restaurant for
Mexican food. Shortly after this incident occurred Chipotle found themselves in
a déjà vu as a norovirus had broken out once again in a Virginia Chipotle in
early July 2017. Chipotles stock had
dropped almost 6%. This not being the
first time that a norovirus had broken out, Chipotle was determined to find out
the cause of this outbreak by conducting an investigation. From the
investigation they concluded the company sick policy was the issue. CEO Steve
Ells said “our leadership there didn’t strictly adhere to our company’s
protocols” (Whitten). Simply Chipotle was not following the company’s safety
guidelines. What was happening was Chipotle workers were being required to work
when they were sick. In a online post a Chipotle employee shared that her
manager made her work even though she told him she was sick. “My boss has told
me that I have no option but to come in tomorrow, and it been heavily implied
that my job will be jeopardy if I don’t come in” (Whitten). The ethical issue
is that Chipotle employees and managers are not following the company safety
protocol. Chipotle vows to serve quality and safe food, if an employee is
serving food while they are sick or a manager is breaking the company’s health
protocol, both are failing to fulfill the duty that they have to the customers.
Stakeholders
The first stakeholders that were
affected by this issue were the stockholders who had invested into the company.
Chipotles stock had dropped 6% percent because of this incident. The next group
of stakeholders affected were the customers. Between 19 and 21 million people
per a year are infected with this virus. The Virginia customers who caught the
virus are the customers who suffered the worst from this issue. Aside from
actually getting the virus, the bad publicity caused a domino effect to the
company. Customers eating at a Chipotle in Boston no longer want to eat there
because they heard about the issue that occurred in Virginia and this made them
fear that they might get sick from the food. The customers trusted that
Chipotle would serve safe and healthy food. Chipotle failed to do this which
broke the customers trust in the company. The next group of stakeholders
affected are the employees. Its clear that the employees caused the issue, but
what about the ones that had nothing to do with getting the customers sick. Not
only are they blamed by the customers but they get a negative reputation for
something they didn’t even do. The managers who forced the sick employees to
work and disregarded safety protocol are notable stakeholders in the norovirus
outbreak.
Individualism
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| Chipotles logo |
Milton
Friedman’s theory of individualism says that the only goal of business is to maximize
profits but must be done within the law. Chipotle got to the point were food
and safety wasn’t as big as getting the sales they needed to increase and get
back to the way things where before all this happened. When customers started
to get sick again there was research done to see what the cause was. It came
out that employees were being forced to work when they were sick. Managers said
that they had no one to replace them and they needed those employees there in
order to make money. Managers also made them fear that they would lose their
job if they didn’t come in to work. Chipotle is violating the rights that
employees have to sick days. They are also violating the safety rights they
have to the customers by serving them food made by someone sick. After this
issue Chipotles sales declined 14.6% and net income went down 44%. The best
thing for chipotle is to get back to focusing on the health and safety of the
customers. They need to focus on making sure that all the food is safe and
healthy. This include keeping a close eye on employees for illnesses and making
sure the food has a sanitary location to be made and consumed. The public
opinion of Chipotle after an incident like this is very harsh and is should be.
Chipotle was so concerned about making a profit that they disregarded the rule
that allows for employees to stay home when they are sick. The public could no longer trust Chipotles
health and safety of food.
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism says that we ought to bring about happiness and pleasure in
all beings capable of feeling it. The reason for this theory is that if
happiness is the most valuable thing, then there is no difference between my
happiness and yours morally speaking. Chipotle is ethically at fault under the
utilitarianism theory. Chipotle should have been aiming to maximize long term
happiness but they were only focusing on short term happiness. The only benefit
from having an employee who is sick come into work is that the employee is
working and the business won’t fall behind and Chipotle will be able to
maximize their profits. Chipotle wasn’t thinking about all the long term things
that could happen from bring a sick employee into work. For starters the
consumers eating the food are going to get sick from the illness that the
employee has. Chipotle was overlooking the long-term happiness of the customer
and instead they were focusing on making Chipotle temporary happy. Breaking the company’s protocol cost them
customers, money, and trust from everyone. The stockholders were also effected
long term. Chipotles stocks once again decreased a big amount. This caused
investors to lose a lot of money. In long term the best thing for everyone is
to let chipotle work out their issues to make sure that employees are following
company protocol and that no sick employees are coming into work serving food.
It may take a while before consumers start to make there way back to chipotle
and investors start to invest into chipotle. But this will only happen if
Chipotle is able to following their protocol
and get back to serving safe and healthy food.
Kantianism
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| A meal at Chipotle |
Kantianism
basic principles are act rationally, allow and help people make rational
decisions, respect others, do what is right because it is right. Chipotle was
violating the principles. The first way they violated Kantianism is they did
not allow or help people make rational decisions. When an employee was trying
to call in sick the manager would not let him and threated the employee if he
didn’t come in. When the employee came
into work it leads to him getting other people sick. Consumers did not have the
rational information about the employee being sick to decide if they were going
to eat at that restaurant. Another way that chipotle violates this ethical
theory is the managers at the Virginia chipotle were not acting rationally. Out
of all the stores at the time why were they only ones getting people sick.
After the incident a few years back, you would think that all Chipotles are
following all protocol. But the manager in Virginia wasn’t acting rationally,
by making sick employees come in and work, which is why they weren’t following
Kantianism theory. Under the formula of humanity, the managers of chipotle in
Virginia did not act rationally. They were forcing employees to come into work
sick and at the same time they weren’t following the company’s protocol. In
order to conform to Kantianism Chipotle must fire the managers in Virginia and
make sure that in the future all employees and managers will be following
company protocol very closely.
Virtue
Theory
In order to
be considered ethical under the virtue theory one must act to embody a variety
of virtuous or good character and avoid bad character traits. There are four
virtues in business which are courage, honesty, temperance, and justice.
Chipotle violates justice by serving food which was not healthy to eat.
Chipotle failed to giver quality products to customers who got sick. They also violated the honest virtue.
Managers weren’t allowing employees sick days which is a bad treatment of
employees. Chipotle did have courage because they were taking the risk of
combining fine and fast food, as you can see from their success it was good
decision. They also showed temperance by starting from nothing and becoming the
successful company they are. Chipotle can become virtuous they just need to
reevaluate their managers and make sure that in the future the food is safe to
eat and that protocol is always being followed.
Work cited
Chan,
Melissa. "Chipotle's E. Coli Outbreak Stumped U.S. Health
Investigators." Time.Com, 2/1/2016, p. 1. EBSCOhost,
search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=113543465&site=ehost-live.
"Chipotle
Store Reopens After Norovirus Scare." USA Today, n.d. EBSCOhost,
search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=J0E055151578317&site=ehost-live.
Feeney,
Nolan. "Chipotle Tweaking Food Prep Methods After E. Coli
Outbreak." Time.Com, 28 Dec. 2015. EBSCOhost,
search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=111997935&site=ehost-live.
Newman,
Jesse and Julie Jargon. "CDC Expected to Declare End to Chipotle E. Coli
Outbreak, Sources Say." Wall Street Journal (Online),
2/1/2016, p. 1. EBSCOhost,
search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=112704054&site=ehost-live.
Rhodan,
Maya. "Chipotle Blames Sick Employees for Norovirus Outbreak." Time.Com,
08 Feb. 2016, p. 61. EBSCOhost,
search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=113504604&site=ehost-live.
Zlati,
Meyer, et al. "Chipotle Upbeat on Earnings despite New Health
Scare." USA Today, n.d. EBSCOhost,
search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=J0E314949120217&site=ehost-live.
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