Out Of the Mouths of Babes: Even Little Ones Have Impact
In this issue, the Image Patrol points out just how important customers of all ages can be to a company's corporate image. First a look at Mattel and how it handled the Cabbage Patch Kids Munch-a-thon, in which a malfunctioning mechanism caused the doll to chew on children's hair. Major publicity finally forced the company into offering refunds but not until after countless talk show hosts had their way with the incident. In contrast, we look at how Nabisco brilliantly turned a surefire black eye into a crowning achievement.
MATTEL:
The facts: Some months before Christmas 1996, Mattel brought out the latest doll in its Cabbage patch family, Cabbage Patch Kids Snack Time Kids.
The doll munched on French fries and carrots with its little mechanical mouth. The only problem was, it also munched on anything else that got in the vicinity - including the hair and even fingers of little girls who received the doll for Christmas.
The media got hold of the story and voila, Mattel gained coverage on every broadcast outlet in the country. Two weeks and 100 reported incidents later, Mattel finally responded by pulling the dolls from the shelves and agreeing to pay $40 to parents who wanted to return the doll.
Even so, the company still suffered a $25.5 million lawsuit from one family claiming their family will need therapy because of an "attack" on their daughter by a Cabbage Patch Kids Snack Time Kids doll.
| CRITERIA | GRADE | COMMENTS | ADVICE |
| Extent of coverage | F | Once again we have a company that through its actions prolonged a crisis. | Take action quickly. If you have to let the lawyers have their say, find one that works 24 hours a day and get it done ASAP. And don't ever talk down to your customers and indicate that you know better than they do what happened. |
| Effectiveness of spokespeople | D | Appeared to be handled entirely by PR spokespeople taking orders from Legal. | They may have gotten all the right legalese out there, but a little empathy would have gone a lot farther. |
| Communication of key message | C | What messages? The only message Mattel key messages communicated is that they were terrified of being sued, so they tried to deny and minimize the problem for as long as possible. Of course they're getting sued anyway which only confirms the greed of California Personal Injury Attorneys. | When crisis hits, be creative, not reactive. Put yourself into the minds of the parents. An offer to replace the dolls with a different doll from Mattel's product line would have gotten the product line some publicity, and made everyone forget the incident much faster. |
| Management of negative messages | B | To their credit, they did an excellent job making sure that the numbers were out there, that this did appear to be a problem of a fairly limited scope. | Turn the negative energy on the greed of personal injury attorneys and point out the social cost (and absurdity) of a $24 million damage claim. |
| Impact on customers | D | Mattel ultimately did the right thing, and offered refunds. But customers certainly aren't going to buy another product from them without being a little nervous. | Work on an image of a caring, socially concerned company that tests its product extensively. |
| Impact on investors | C | Investors may worry about a company that takes that long to act, never mind the impact a prolonged lawsuit might have on earnings. | Make sure that management appears more decisive in the future. The cost of a damaged reputation is far higher than whatever it cost to replace a few dolls. |
| Impact on employees, and prospective employees | D | This is the sort of incident that makes life difficult for employees. There's nothing employees worse than having your company be the butt of every joke on every late night TV show. | Make sure employees have all the key messages and are prepared to act as spokespeople, even if it's only at the corner pub. |
| Overall Score | D | Mattel was caught in a ridiculous situation by a product it created. If the company had acted quickly enough to take the product off the market and offer refunds or better alternatives, the talk shows wouldn't have had time to have such a field day. Unfortunately, the incident is now part of everyone's repertoire of bad product stories. | Develop a creative SWAT team that is authorized to act on consumers' behalf in the event of a problem. Make sure there are some children on the team, so you get an accurate perspective. |
NABISCO:
The facts: On Jan. 7, Nabisco sent their "cookie technician" Jessica Aronofsky down to Wadesboro, N.C., in response to letters from third graders at Wadesboro Central Elementary School questioning the company's claim of 1,000 chips per bag. The students challenged Nabisco after counting just 680 chocolate chips in a bag of the cookies. After counting with the cookie technician, the kids totaled 1,181 chips.
Nabisco said the students made the mistake of only counting the chocolate chips visible on the outside of the cookies. In addition, Nabisco is offering $25,000 in scholarships to students who can find the most creative way of counting chips.
| CRITERIA | GRADE | COMMENTS | ADVICE |
| Extent of coverage | A | A classic case of making lemonade out of lemons. Turn a potential black eye from a bunch of school kids into the PR coup of the year. What they did right was carefully orchestrate the response so the right messages were communicated and everyone knew about it. One article even credited Nabsico's PR machine. | When you can turn something to your advantage, do it, and then tell everyone about it. A great example of a company willing to take some risks -- and stand by their product. |
| Effectiveness of spokespeople | A | Whether the "spokesperson" was in fact a "cookie technician" or the manager of corporate communications really didn't matter. The result was that the world knows that Nabisco doesn't lie on its packages. | Put the spokesperson in front of the cameras. Too often corporate spokespeople hide in headquarters or behind a telephone. This was a great example of the benefits of putting the right mouth in front of the cameras at the right time. |
| Communication of key messages | A | The message that came across was that Nabisco does in fact live up to its word, despite what the public might think of other packaged goods companies. A brilliant piece of competitive positioning. Nabisco also came across as caring, and concerned about its customers | The key to the effectiveness of Nabisco's communications was that they really only had one message -- we don't lie on our packages. By bringing in "technicians" and making it scientific, they provided perfect proof points. |
| Management of negative messages | A | Whoever orchestrated this one must have studied Martial Arts. They turned their weaknesses into strengths. Nabisco didn't hide from the accusations, they embraced them - and as a result there were no lingering negative messages. | Own the problem, and then turn it to your own advantage. |
| Impact on customers | A+++ | Teachers and parents will feel better about eating Chips Ahoy, and the children never said they didn't taste good. | When you have a good story, spread it around. By publicizing the solution, Nabisco made sure that as many of their customers as possible knew that in fact they had MORE than 1,000 chips. |
| Impact on investors | ?? | Probably none, do they even allow cookies on the floor of the stock exchange? | The message to investors is -- these guys have a great communications department. |
| Impact on employees, and prospective employees | A | It's rare when a giant American conglomerate hows a sense of humor and fun. This is a good example of making employees feel proud to go to work the next day. By emphasizing the human, individual nature of the company - sending out cookie technicians - the company becomes less of a monolith and more of a caring corporate citizen. | By emphasizing the human, individual nature of the company -- sending out cookie technicians -- the company becomes less of a monolith and more of a caring corporate citizen. |
| Overall Score | A+++ | Perfect strategy, perfect messaging, perfect execution. | The kind of situation we all dream about. You have the facts on your side, it offers a great photo-op, and it's impossible to be negative when getting cookies and milk! |
Katharine Paine is founder and CEO of The Delahaye Group, an international image consulting firm based in Portsmouth, N.H. Over the past decade she and her firm have analyzed more than 1 million articles, studied thousands of Internet postings and interviewed thousands of event attendees to provide quantitative and qualitative measures of success for her clients. Her column on measurement will appear monthly in PR NEWS. Paine can be reached at 603/431-0111. Visit the company's Web site at http://www.delahaye.com