Analysis of Case studies - Research Paper Example

While they had previously taken an active approach to advertising their nursing formulas, they now stepped back and adopted an approach that was basically hands off. The official statement in these regards reads, “Nestle leaves the recommendation of appropriate breast-milk substitutes to health professionals and for almost 20 years has stopped all promotion of infant formula to the public.” In terms of theoretical perspectives one notes that Nestle has shifted from a semiotic understanding of consumers as entirely alien to one wherein they represent While Nestle has taken a hands-off approach to advertising its formula, the fact remains that the products still exist.

In these regards, one must consider that there may be an element of moral deafness occurring. This is the theoretical perspective wherein members of a company neglect the immoral aspects of the company for a variety of socially conditioned reasons. This is a highly complex issue that would require insight from medicine and health professionals to determine the extent that consuming nursing formulas over breast-feeding represents a significant health risk. From a cursory perspective, it seems that there are viable reasons for the existence of milk formula and that its production alone does not count as an element of moral deafness. . the accusation that McDonalds had duped customers into believing that their French fries were vegetarian, when in actuality that included beef extract.

This controversy sparked off outrage throughout the world, most markedly in India where vegetarianism is not simply matter of personal or political choice, but of religious significance. McDonalds was targeted with a multi-billion dollar class action lawsuit that contended the company had purposely been deceitful in this process. When examining the issue in terms of contemporary communication theory a number of insights can be articulated in regards to how McDonald’s handled the situation. The major theoretical lens through which this issue can be understood examines it in terms of noise; in large, part this is represented through the encoder, message, channel, decoder spectrum of understanding.

Where along the lines McDonald’s message was either purposely obfuscated, or structured in such a way that it signification was misunderstood by individuals along the path of codification. In large part, McDonald’s took a clear and direct approach to its handling of the situation. Rather than attempting to cover up the incident or denying that it occurred McDonald’s issue a clear and direct apology to those concerned with the incident. The apology outlined in detail McDonald’s production process, including demonstrating that in certain areas beef products were utilized in production; however, in Middle Eastern countries and India, where the utilization of beef products was of primary concern they were not utilized.

In addition to the effectiveness of the communication response that was implemented, McDonald’s also utilized adequate financial incentives to back up its apology. In these regards, nearly $10 million