Everyone loves a great deal, whether it’s for a casual restaurant or luxurious spa. If you’ve been living under a rock, Groupon is a convenient online site that finds these steals for consumers without clipping coupons. It claims to help struggling local businesses gain new customers and sales, but merchants in the service industry must beware that Groupon may potentially hurt their business instead of improving it. The online site looks out for the consumer’s best interest and not the business.

Local businesses look to Groupon as an alternative to traditional advertisements. Groupon will draw in merchants by creating a promotional deal up to 50 percent off in which they promise sales increase and new clients. According to Huffington Post writer, Amy Lee, “one merchant proclaimed that signing up for Groupon was the “single worst business decision” she had made. Her story echoes other merchants who have claimed that Groupons result in unprofitability, administrative nightmares, and, to cap it all off, that they don’t result in new regular customers.” Groupon makes it hard for merchants to profit from these low deals. In some instances, businesses in the service industry end up losing money.

I’ve had the experience of working with Groupon at my current salon job. The company has been struggling so they thought it would bring great opportunity to gain new customers and increase sales of monthly memberships. I believe bringing Groupon into the company had the opposite effect. I’ve found that most of these customers already existed in our system and only handfuls were new. In addition, clients who seek bargains will wait around for the next deal to pop up on Groupon. I kept seeing the same, reoccurring customer purchase one Groupon deal after another. They would never sign up for memberships after their deal was used or expired as the company anticipated. After we would stop running the deals, majority of our clients would discontinue using our services and search for better deals elsewhere. In this case, I believe Groupon did not work in our favor and devalued our company even more than developing it further.

Sources:
http://www.bu.edu/today/2011/groupon-bad-for-business/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/10/groupon-merchants_n_874896.html
http://www.pdco.com/node/88470

Lush is a company that has been making fresh, homemade cosmetics since 1995. Products include, but are not limited to, soaps, face masks, shampoos, bath fizzes, and lotions. Lush stays away from processed, synthetic ingredients that can aggravate sensitive skin types. Instead they use the freshest ingredients to date, so they can have the best quality products around.

In class, we touched on topics such as sustainability and ethical values. Lush has a strong commitment to their “Green Policy” by considering where materials come from. Lush’s operation crew meets with producers and visits the locations to make sure environmental impact is minimal when harvesting ingredients. They will make the decision not to purchase materials if production causes harm to the environment. Lush sets the bar for ethical standards by examining conditions for the workers and keep up with wages to secure financial gain. This helps build a strong connection with the workers so they can get the best out of their products and make a positive impact on the community.

Lush is working hard on keeping their packaging more environmentally friendly by making it less wasteful. Some of their products such as bath bombs and soap bars do not require packaging at all. By doing this they help prevent plastic and waste from entering landfills. All other products that use containers are made from 100% recycled materials. The eco-friendly company plans to keep working hard on furthering design by making it biodegradable in the future. Lush makes sustainability their top priority when producing products for their customers.

Not only does Lush promotes environmental and humanitarian causes but passionately fights for animals. They do not purchase from any manufacturer who test products on animals. Instead, Lush tests safety of their products on human volunteers. They one day hope to influence other companies in the cosmetic industry to put an end to animal testing. Lush runs a number of campaigns with their most well known being equal marriage, elimination of plastic bags, and the ban of seal hunting. Lush is constantly dipping their toes in world issues to help make a positive impact in the world. The world needs more companies like Lush to shed light on environmental and humanitarian issues.

What are your thoughts?
Do you know of any ethical companies like Lush? How do they make a positive impact to the world?

Sources:
http://www.lushusa.com/Our-Story/our-story,en_US,pg.html