British Columbia Institute Business Communications Email Skills Exercise

by

Business Finance

Write the message called for in the situation described, using reader-focused language and a professional tone. The question text begins: “According to a report published by Statistics Canada…”

  • Make up any details necessary, as long as they are consistent with this case; use your own words and include the relevant details.
  • Save your document as a Word document and include your name and the assignment number in the file name.
  • If you want to ensure you use the “direct approach” correctly, you can use the optional planning sheet in this module to plan your message (do not hand this plan sheet in, please).

From Business Communications Essentials:

Email Skills / Sustainability
Media Skills: Email

According to a report published by Statistics Canada, in 2008, the proportion of people who purchased or boycotted a product for ethical reasons rose to 27 percent of the population, compared to 20 percent in 2003. Given this growing awareness about the environmental impact of our consumer behaviour, opportunities may exist for your company to make some changes that would broaden the appeal of your product to green consumers. You work for Caneast Foods, a chain of small grocery stores in Ontario. Currently produce is packaged on Styrofoam trays, something you would like to see replaced with a green product. You looked at some products available from Earthcycle Packaging (www.earthcycle.com) and Go-Green (http://gogreenpackaging.com) and think your company should consider making the switch to this type of packaging or something similar. As well, you have been looking at ways to use social media to connect with customers and develop customer relationships and loyalty. Your boss is not that familiar with the use of social media, so the stores have not capitalized on how to use it to develop customer engagement.

Your task: Write an email message to your boss suggesting that the company research the costs and benefits of switching from Styrofoam packaging to an alternative green product. Suggest two different social media channels the store might use to let consumers know about the change, and include a brief description of each media and how the store would benefit from using it.