Recently Burger King’s advertisement antics have been a marketing nightmare if not corporate suicide in my opinion. What the heck is going on over there at corporate BK anyway? It seems as though they are trying to impress us with your tasteless presentations using “shock” propaganda to get our attention.

Really now, business must be pretty bad for Burger King when you feel you have to resort to making fun of and disrespecting Latinos or try to convince parents the BKing singing about his love for square butts, and his desire to “get with” SpongeBob while ladies shake their booties and “square butts” to Sir Mix-a-Lot’s “Baby Got Back” is unbelievable! And get this: the ad was made in partnership with the children’s television station, Nickelodeon.

I read the Campaign for Commercial-Free Childhood has started a letter writing campaign to ask BK and Nickelodeon to pull the ad and respect our children. Shine reported many parents were outraged over this commercial but the truth is I also read some of the parents comments on the site found no offense to this type of advertisement (I was really disturbed by that!).

I have been in business for over 20 years now. I believe with all my heart business (large and small) has a supreme responsibility to the well being of our audience and fellowman. Business today has an incredible opportunity to show they have a soul, to usher in change for good, provide solutions that benefit the people, and actually lead in the marketplace. Coupled with the fact most consumers don’t trust the integrity of most companies today and there is a very real chance consumers are conversing about your company via the social network, why would you not pay attention to what your motives are when it comes to serving your customer?

I believe the days of being in business to “just make money” are quickly existing. Business today has the most awesome opportunity to step out of the pack by being built around a meaningful purpose that brings good to the whole…not just their pockets. Yes…I believe the loss of business ethics as a principle driving force for many companies (entrepreneurs and small business included) is one of the reasons we are seeing such a breakdown in trust and relationships with the customer.

(SmartPros) “The biggest victim of ethical lapse is trust. A small breach of ethics is often known only between a few people. But this knowledge can destroy trust between fellow employees, and from there make its way up the ladder, destroying trust between employee and supervisor, and between divisions of companies. When ethical lapses become rampant, employee productivity declines, loyalty follows, soon major breaches such as employee theft begin to appear. Eventually, and worst of all, the most important advantage a firm has, the trust between a firm and its clients, erodes. Why has such an important topic as business ethics gone unnoticed, even actively ignored? The biggest reason is that ethics is largely misunderstood. Ethical behavior-behavior conducted with honesty and integrity, has recently become muddled up with moral or political questions”.

Couldn’t have said it better myself.

So I guess the question here is does business have an obligation to ethical standards? In my books YES! My business will always keep this in the forefront. I’m jus sayin.

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