article reflection
500-750words article reflection only wiht my listed material. SEE wayfair for more instruction.
In summer 2019,
Wayfair accepted a contract with a supplier for the U.S. Department of Homeland Services
for $200,000 to furnish a refugee detention camp[footnoteRef:1] at the U.S. border that would/does detain up to 3,000 refugee children. [1: Note: I refer to these places as Refugee detention camps. There is much disagreement about the wording of these places. Words matter. Conservative advocates might call them immigration detention camps, while more progressive critiques have called them refugee concentration camps, citing the multitude of deaths of refugees in the camps, including children, and the unsafe living conditions. If you have strong feelings about how we refer to these places, please feel free to educate us in your reflection. ]
As a response, 547 employees at Wayfair jointly signed and sent a petition to Wayfair leadership asking them to cancel the contract and to stop doing business with all border camps going forward. Additionally, they asked that the company donate all proceeds from the current contract to the
Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services (RAICES)
.
Wayfair’s leadership responded with the following statement:
“As a retailer, it is standard practice to fulfill orders for all customers and we believe it is our business to sell to any customer who is acting within the laws of the countries in which we operate. We believe all of our stakeholders, employees, customers, investors and suppliers included, are best served by our commitment to fulfill all orders. This does not indicate support for the opinions or actions of the groups or individuals who purchase from us.”
The company subsequently fulfilled the order with the supplier. Employees then staged a walkout to protest. Progressive politicians voiced support for employees (e.g. AOC and Elizabeth Warren). Some vocal customers promised to create a boycott of the company. A year and half later, little seems to have happened.
Question for your Weekly Reflection
If you were a board member for Wayfair, would you have 1) accepted and fulfilled the contract, 2) rejected the contract, or 3) something else. Explain and justify your decision. Use the two readings from Ciulla and Wettstein to support your argument. Answer in 500-750 words. Remember, you are an executive board member of a Fortune 500 company. Make a strong, persuasive argument.