Valdez, Jazehl Joy

K31
Gardenia Philippines’ Scandal; A slice of Negligence

Gardenia Philippines is one of the largest bread manufacturing companies in the

country; Thus, they are not only known to produce soft, tasty and nutritious bread but also
by their no-touch system, which means that no human hand has touched their bread in
the process. Ironically, a viral video that was uploaded by Abi Cabanding, a facebook
user, showed one of Gardenia’s delivery staff stealing slices of bread in public which
disgusted a lot of consumers.
Gardenia quickly addressed the situation by expressing how "saddened" they were
and said that they are taking the necessary steps and measures to avoid similar
incident(s) and later on announces that those were the unsold bread that is to be disposed
of. Nevertheless, the incident has garnered varied opinions from the netizens. Several
people pitied the guy – besides, how poor would a person have to be to merely steal
slices of bread just to alleviate hunger? But, all things considered, the reputation of
Gardenia has been severely damaged. Not only will they be suffering from possible losses
and demand for the innovation of their packaging, but they also have to reevaluate their
employees and intricately investigate the cause. Personally, I believe Gardenia may not
have been able to properly train and assess their employees, or that these employees
are simply just underpaid and overworked at the same time.
I suggest that Gardenia should provide intensive training for their employees in
order to avoid unanticipated employee issues that may harm their company internally and
externally. More so, I believe that changing their packaging is only a short-term solution
as issues like these may arise again, but possibly in a different way. Thus, a long-term
solution would be intricately training their employees and having them comply with the
rules and regulations of the company, considering that they are in the food industry. If
their employees are continued to be treated as they are, changing a mere outer layer of
a product won’t change a thing. Gardenia should allow performance management and
employee feedback and provide a proper organizational chart in order to monitor each
and every of their employees effectively.

CoconutsManila. (2019, September 20). Gardenia Philippines investigates viral video showing
delivery staff stealing bread: Coconuts Manila. Retrieved November 27, 2019, from
https://coconuts.co/manila/news/gardenia-philippines-investigates-viral-video-showing-delivery-
staff-stealing-bread/.