Ethics and Customer Loyalty
“COLGATE DISTASTEFUL TOOTHPASTE”
CASE STUDY
Case Overview:-
Colgate is a very well known company in the United States and is remembered for its toothpaste. It not only specializes in personal care but in household care as well. They are not only into oral care but in personal care, home care and pet nutrition as well. The New York based company also included Ajax, Fab, and Hill pet foods. Colgate is well known in other countries such as Australia, Latin America, Canada, France, and Germany.
Colgate learnt a hard lesson in 1985 by getting into a partnership with Hawley and hazel. This strategy was used to enter the Asian market place (Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, and Taiwan).This step has made them see the company’s downfall. Initially everything was going well; gradually it has changed and saw a downfall in company’s revenues. Hawley and Hazel’s key product was ADarkie toothpaste. The maker of this product came up with this name by traveling to the United States and falling in love with a very well known black-faced entertainer (a white person with black makeup on his face), named Al Jolson. The founder decided to recreate the character’s big smile and white teeth. He decided to copyright the name ADarkie to go along with his logo. At first the toothpaste featuring a black man with a big white smile was a perfect advertising scheme and it was sold in Asia for over 60 years. The named reached United States as Colgate thought of selling it in the American markets and it was criticized immediately. The name ADarkie was considered to be a very racist and distasteful brand name. When the name was brought to the attention of the ICCR, the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, in a package they received from Thailand, they started a fight against Colgate. The ICCR wrote a letter to Colgate asking them to change the name and logo of this distasteful product.
1. CRITICAL ISSUES OF COLGATE:-
Issue here is about the logo of the toothpaste called
CASE STUDY
Case Overview:-
Colgate is a very well known company in the United States and is remembered for its toothpaste. It not only specializes in personal care but in household care as well. They are not only into oral care but in personal care, home care and pet nutrition as well. The New York based company also included Ajax, Fab, and Hill pet foods. Colgate is well known in other countries such as Australia, Latin America, Canada, France, and Germany.
Colgate learnt a hard lesson in 1985 by getting into a partnership with Hawley and hazel. This strategy was used to enter the Asian market place (Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, and Taiwan).This step has made them see the company’s downfall. Initially everything was going well; gradually it has changed and saw a downfall in company’s revenues. Hawley and Hazel’s key product was ADarkie toothpaste. The maker of this product came up with this name by traveling to the United States and falling in love with a very well known black-faced entertainer (a white person with black makeup on his face), named Al Jolson. The founder decided to recreate the character’s big smile and white teeth. He decided to copyright the name ADarkie to go along with his logo. At first the toothpaste featuring a black man with a big white smile was a perfect advertising scheme and it was sold in Asia for over 60 years. The named reached United States as Colgate thought of selling it in the American markets and it was criticized immediately. The name ADarkie was considered to be a very racist and distasteful brand name. When the name was brought to the attention of the ICCR, the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, in a package they received from Thailand, they started a fight against Colgate. The ICCR wrote a letter to Colgate asking them to change the name and logo of this distasteful product.
1. CRITICAL ISSUES OF COLGATE:-
Issue here is about the logo of the toothpaste called