Economies of Scale and Tainted Beef

Was reading more this morning about the tainted beef recall from the XL Foods meat packing plant in Alberta. Apparently this plant is the second largest in Canada. The slogan is: "Big Enough to Supply; Small Enough to Serve".

The article I was reading indicated this plant, which employs about 2000 people was built to take advantage of 'economies of scale'.

The 'economies of scale' notion is, of course, one which emerged with the industrial revolution, and is suggested as a positive driver of business. As a holder of a business degree myself, I know that when economies of scale are talked about, there is never any real talk about 'disasters of scale'. However, in this case, again we can see a mega disaster in action with all the accompanying costs; and the people who are now sick, and the out-of work employees, in military terms, are probably 'collatoral damage'.... unless you happen to be one of them.

In 1982, the author Kirkpatrick Sale authored the book, "Human Scale", in which he suggested that there is an appropriate maximum size for all human undertakings; and that when considering the idea of 'progress', we ought to think about the ecological implications of making things too big.

This XL case might be just another example that we ought to look seriously at the ideas Sale expressed (think about the recent financial system meltdown, Toyota's accelerator pedal recalls, the BP oil spill, etc.). All such events suggest that we might be well served by a more complex understanding of the idea of economies of scale and the accompanying costs.

On the weekend I was in a Pub in Vancouver, British Columbia.  On the food menu it was interesting to see items featured, proudly proclaiming to be made with Alberta beef.  I suspect that the original 'economies of scale' are currently meaning something different to this pub and others like it.  Tainted meat is now tainted brand.