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Tiffany & Co: A Case Study in Diamonds and Social Responsibility
Michael J. Kowalski, chairman and
CEO of Tiffany & Co., the world-famous luxury jeweler and specialty
retailer, wasted no time correcting what he called a "misperception" about
his company's products. |
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"Jewelry is not discretionary," Kowalski began when he recently addressed
MBA students in Wharton marketing professor Stephen J. Hoch's marketing
class and in four other classrooms participating via videoconferencing
hookups. "It fulfills a need for human adornment."
Following a quick burst of laughter, Kowalski and the students returned to
the morning's more serious discussion, a case study called "Tiffany & Co.: A
New Gold Standard." Written by Wharton second-year graduate student Miriam
Zalcman, the study was triggered by Kowalski's open letter advertisement to
Dale Bosworth, chief of the U. S. Forest Service, published in The
Washington Post on March 24, 2004.
In the letter, Kowalski criticized the government's reliance on an
antiquated law used to grant approval for the development of a silver mine –
to be called Rock Creek Mine – in Montana's Kootenai National Forest.
Kowalski cited the environmental hazards that the proposed copper and silver
mine would produce, ranging from millions of gallons of waste water to "vast
quantities of mine tailings – a polite term for toxic sludge." As Kowalski
wrote in his letter: "Minerals should – and can – be extracted, processed
and used in ways that are environmentally and socially responsible.
Government and industry each has a role to play in shaping sensible measures
to achieve this goal."
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This article is suggested by Anand Mann
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