Chipotle is learning the hard way rule number one of the restaurant business: Make sure people feel that your food is safe to eat. Whatever claims that you may make about your food being organic, locally sourced or from animals that were naturally raised, treated well, unstressed, did yoga, etc. will have little effect if people think your food results in food poisoning. (Disclaimer: Investigations into Chipotle’s food safety practices are ongoing and have not yielded definitive findings yet, and Chipotle never said that their cows do yoga.) Since July of 2015, Chipotle customers have suffered from two norovirus outbreaks in Simi Valley, Calif., and Boston, Mass., two E. coli outbreaks, and one Salmonella outbreak in Minnesota. Regardless of whether the outbreaks prove to be coincidences or the result of deficient food safety practices, they have left Chipotle squeezed into an increasingly tight burrito. Chipotle is now facing drops in sales, declining stock prices, a criminal investigation and most recently an investor lawsuit that claims that Chipotle failed to maintain food safety standards and disclose potential risks.
KSWFoodWorld
FoodWorld 