•      As mentioned in the case, CAFOs or confined animal feeding operations are believed to be harmful to animals and the environment as a whole. Therefore, getting milk from a supplier that uses CAFOs compromises Ben and Jerry’s mission as one of Ben and Jerry’s main components is to make the world a better place through innovation and other means. However, dealing with suppliers that use CAFOs means that Ben and Jerry are contributing, even if indirectly, to damaging animals and pollution through land, water, and air, which in turn has an adverse negative impact on humans. As a result, Ben and Jerry’s CSR mission would be compromised and no longer valid.

•      Greenwashing is the term used to describe organizations that tend to make the world believe their operations are sustainable, environmentally friendly, and socially responsible when they are actually not. In this case, Ben and Jerry consider making the world a better place as one of the core components of their mission as a business. However, through business growth and expansion, especially after becoming a global brand owned by Unilever, the challenges of keeping up with that socially responsible core component have indeed become harder.

     With the need to get their primary raw material from a supplier that uses and implements CAFOs, and since Ben and Jerry already market themselves as seekers for improving the world and changing it into a better place, then dealing with the milk supplier would be considered as greenwashing, as in promoting social responsibility, when in fact dealing with suppliers that harm the environment, animals, and possibly humans in the long run.

     Therefore, the acquisition by Unilever has led Ben and Jerry to take decisions and deal with suppliers that cause a contradiction with their socially responsible mission and objective of improving the world, which is undoubtedly a form of greenwashing.