R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co Ethical Issues

Introduction

The case study “Uptown, Dakota and PowerMaster” introduce the company R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. plan to bring the Uptown which is a menthol cigarettes and target to the black American smokers. RJR try to use Uptown help them deal with the problem of decreasing sales from their cigarettes market. However, RJR Tobacco Co. cancelled plans for Uptown during 19th January, 1990 which was caused by some opposite opinions from interest groups which related to the human health issues. Then Dakota became another plan of RJR in April, 1990. They tried to use this new product to text market again. Dakota focus on the female market, especially the young women with poorly-educated and blue-collar, and also they expand the market to man as well, however, the same result as Uptown, RJR Tobacco Co. failed this test again, because the positive publicity which mentioned that the people should quit smoking if they are well-to-do and with well-educated. At the same time, not only the cigarettes industry but also the alcohol market also suffers the same problem, declining consumption issue. The biggest alcohol brewer in 1991, PowerMaster , their target group also focus on the black consumers, however, some contemporary interest organisation found that the anti-alcohol bring more diseases, such as higher death rate than whites which was just caused by the alcohol. So it still very difficult to PowerMaster to deal with their market problem based on without any health issues.

The purpose of this case analysis report is aim to concern about the ethics issue and marketing strategies, such as how to balance the ethical behaviour and business profit at the same time, and try to deal with the problem from both company and interest groups sides as well.

In this case analysis report, it will go through the ethical issues which occurred in the “Uptown, Dakota, and PowerMaster” to analyse. Then it will give an analysis in both company and interest groups point of view which is depends on Stakeholder Interaction Model. In addition, this report will consider all of the alternatives and examine the advantages and disadvantages of them. Finally, at the end of this report, it will show the recommendation and implementation of RJR Tobacco Co., PowerMaster and the related interest groups.

Analysis

Ethical Issues Analysis

In the Uptown and Dakota case, the RJR Tobacco Co. thought the black Americans and young high school degrees females have their personal rights to choose which cigarette they want and which product is suitable for them. And RJR Tobacco Co. brought the new brand cigarette, such as Uptown and Dakota (Smith 1995), it cannot affect the decision or attitudes of the smoker to smoke, it is not the most serious reason to effect on the smoker whether they quit smoke or not. On the contrary, the interest groups hold their