Marketing and Ethics

Marketing tactics such as pricing, promotion, placement, and product decisions all help business owners create a need for their products or services. What managers seldom realize, however, is that the marketing decisions they make primarily to increase sales and market share have a great impact on society at large and thus have significant ethical implications. These seven caselets, which cover a variety of topics (including "the article of the half-truth," "creative interview tactics," and "truthfully representing your company"), explore the ethical implications of decision making in the marketing arena. Excerpt UVA-E-0351 April 19, 2010 Marketing and Ethics A Night to Remember: Personal Time on Your Client's Dime Frustrated, Florence Drake sat at her desk. Her evening, which was to include a date with the gym and a healthy salad, had just been preempted. Five minutes earlier, Allen Shumann, senior executive producer of News Today New York, had called to ask Drake to dinner that night. She had been trying in vain to arrange dinner with him so that she could talk up her clients. Their schedules had not been compatible—until now. Although she longed for a simple evening at the gym and then at home, she could not pass up this opportunity to pitch her client's upcoming big event to Shumann. News Today New York exposure would help establish Drake's credibility in the firm and give her a chance at that big promotion. Drake grabbed her purse and gray wool coat and dashed swiftly out the agency's front door. Within minutes, Drake was hailing a cab to meet Shumann at Bank Street Grill, one of New York's finest steak and seafood houses. While dining on filet mignon and drinking many glasses of her favorite Cabernet Sauvignon, Drake discussed a variety of topics with Shumann. In addition to telling him about her client's upcoming event, she gave him some background on the other brands she represented and even spoke about her own journey into the world of public relations. Overall, she felt as though the night had been a great success. She had achieved two goals: establishing a working relationship with one of the nation's leading producers and bringing her client to his attention. And although there was no guarantee he would cover the event, she believed it was a job well done. After all, he did ask her to send additional information about the event and said he might send someone to cover it. After dinner, Drake parted ways with Shumann and met two of her best friends at a local West Village bar. After learning about where she had dined and how much she had spent at dinner (approximately $ 180), her friends could not believe that she was going to bill this dinner to a client. “Was it really necessary to take this producer out to the one of the finest restaurants in the city when there are numerous other options?” one asked her. Another asked, “Will your client be made privy to the fact that you two ordered a bottle of wine, two martinis, and after-dinner drinks during the meal? Also, how would you even put that on your expense report?” Drake knew that her friends just liked giving her a hard time. But something didn't feel quite right about what they said. . . .