Drill 5 ·
Business Ethics: Thornwick Nursery is a practice drill. It contains 5 original questions created by Brian Stewart, a Barron's test prep author with over 20 years of tutoring experience.
This drill explores a business ethics stakeholder tradeoff and uses an invented company and original figures.
Thornwick Nursery grows and sells potted plants, shrubs, and trees. To lower costs, managers are considering switching from a slow-release fertilizer that staff mix by hand to a cheaper pre-mixed fertilizer that a supplier delivers ready to use. The change would cut labor hours and supply costs, but the cheaper fertilizer is known to run off into nearby waterways more easily during heavy rain, which has drawn complaints from a neighborhood association downstream. The table shows how the change would affect four groups connected to the nursery.
Estimated effect of the fertilizer change on each stakeholder group
| Stakeholder group | Main effect of the change |
|---|---|
| Owners | Lower costs; higher profit margin |
| Seasonal workers | Fewer mixing hours; reduced pay |
| Nearby residents | More fertilizer runoff into local water |
| Customers | Slightly lower plant prices |