It seems that the catalyst for the sudden outcry on social media with regard to how large retailers operate, is the Touchee Feelee - Woolworths debacle where Euodia Roets of Touchee Feelee is calling out WoolWorths for allegedly stealing her hummingbird design.
Woolworths claim the use of hummingbirds was a global trend and commissioned a Durban artist to interpret this trend in August last year (before their dealings with Roets), resulting in the cushion designs you see in the shops today.
Then there's the question of whether Roets had the right to use the image in the first place… but as the title of this article suggests we'd like to forget about the hummingbirds for a second and ask the question: are business ethics really as clear cut as they're made out to be? Is this just a case of big retailers playing hardball or are they really abusing their position and power? Do big retail chains maybe not just have better trained staff involved in these negotiations and meetings?
You could, if you wanted, argue that big retails chains operate in a fiercely competitive environment and need to be ruthless to survive, but I'd say that being unethical is never excusable and big retailers have a responsibility to operate ethically and with good intentions above everything else.
It's obvious to each and every one of us (hopefully) that stealing an idea, or plagiarising someone else's work, is the wrong thing to do, but we'd like to move away from finger pointing (as it rarely accomplishes much…) and find a way forward to stop things like this from happening altogether.
So what can we do?
Luckily for us business is governed by rules, if we're smart about it we can make sure that things like this never happen to us.
You can create safeguards in the form of confidentiality agreements so that if something like this happens, and you're in the right, it's more than just your word against theirs and you'll have a clear case for recourse.
Secondly, you can stand together as small businesses and refuse to be taken advantage of by not doing business with corporates who are known to operate unethically.
And furthermore you should always operate ethically yourself, making ethical practices the norm both within your company and in all of its dealings.
It can be enticing to go into business with the big guys and have your products donning their shelves, but the sad truth is that for some of these large companies ethics simply don't factor in - that's just the reality.
This is something that you have to be aware of, but that doesn't mean it's the only way business is done. There are many large companies out there who operate ethically and responsibly and don't deserve to be painted with the same brush - for you it's just a matter of deciding which is which.