1. Summarize the case and define clearly the main

premise or thesis of the case, from a marketing perspective

Using Antibiotics Proudly

Antibiotics for poultry are bad, right? That seems to be the consensus, based on retail packaging that touts the products' antibiotic- free status, announcements by chicken sup-pliers that they will stop using antibiotics in their operations, press releases by restaurant chains promising a lack of antibiotics in their chicken dishes, and demands from consumers for "clean" chicken and egg options. But Sanderson Farms, the nation's third largest supplier of chicken, contests the very premise and therefore is making its continued insis-tence on using antibiotics part of its marketing campaign, to set itself apart from its competitors.

The concern about the use of antibiotics fo-cuses specifically on those medications that also are approved for use in humans. The the-ory suggests that if these antibiotics are used too widely in poultry production, the bacteria they are intended to kill will develop into drug-resistant strains, with resulting threats to human and animal health and welfare. The threat to consumers is not the antibiotics them-selves; federal regulations require that any products being sold for consumption must be free of antibiotics. Thus, every package of chicken in the grocers' case is antibiotic free, and Sanderson Farms asserts that marketing products on the basis of their lack of antibiotics actually is misleading. In the process of raising the chickens, many producers dose the animals with antibiotics, often in vitro, to reduce the occurrence of disease.