I USED to be Chipotle’s biggest fan. Looking back, it makes me sick to think about how many people I introduced to the big burritos. Don’t get me wrong. Their food is great. It’s the way they portray conventional agriculture that I have a beef with. They run ads in the K-State Collegian and have billboards making claims like “We get our drugs from the doctor not our beef,” “Chicken from farms, not big pharm,” “Chicken raised with care, not chemicals,” “We’re anti-antibiotics but pro beef” and “Pork from farmers not factories.” At one point they even had a worksheet for kids in their resteraunt that instructs kids to circle what is wrong in a picture that has a needle sticking our of a pigs back and a semi labeled drugs. After students raised concerns, Chipotle representatives came to speak with K-State ag students last year. I came away from the meeting with the realization their persistent attacks on conventional ag were a top down stratagey. Instead of listening to their customers, Chipotle’s CEO is expressing his personal beliefs in the company’s advertising. I used to eat Chipotle whenever I had a chance. Now I won’t go near the place.
Click on this link to read a misinformed K-State Collegian editorial over this subject from last spring. The second link is my letter to the editor that was printed a few days later.
http://media.www.kstatecollegian.com/media/storage/paper1022/news/2007/04/25/Opinion/Consumers.Should.Appreciate.Purchase.Meat.Raised.Without.Chemicals.Restaurants.S-2879717.shtml
http://media.www.kstatecollegian.com/media/storage/paper1022/news/2007/05/01/Opinion/Conventional.Beef.Is.Just.As.Safe.And.Healthy-2889872.shtml
2 Comments
October 17, 2007 at 2:44 pm
Hey, just wanted to let you know that I appreciate you writing on the topic of beef and natural beef. I’m a big fan of chipotle, but I like to think that I’m unbiased (I’ve pointed out some of their problems in the past…).
Anyway, I responded to this post and wanted to let you know about:
http://chipotlog.com/blog/greg/ranchers-vs-chipotle-is-business-as-usual-good-enough
May 10, 2008 at 8:36 pm
Chipotle tastes delicious. Need I say more?