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Edward Bernays developed the successful "Green Ball" campaign for Lucky Strike in 1934. Public relations pioneer Edward Bernays used the social sciences as a tool to motivate or shape the response of a general or particular audience. A master of staging events and making them seem spontaneous, Bernays would sometimes sell a product by pretending to be selling something else. In one particular case he used "women's liberation" as a way to double the cigarette market. The American Tobacco Company, the makers of Lucky Strike cigarettes hired Bernays to find out ways to make public smoking acceptable for women. At a time when the harmful effects of smoking were unproven, Bernays set up a march of young debutantes down Fifth Avenue in New York City. Carrying the cigarettes they called their "torches of freedom," their parade was heralded as a march against women's inequality. The completely contrived event was crafted to look so "real" that it made front-page news nationwide the next day and prompted a debate over whether women should be able to smoke as publicly as men. Many historians say this event forever changed the social image of smoking. Suddenly, women smoking cigarettes were cool. To make Lucky Strikes more attractive to women, Bernays suggested that American Tobacco change the color of its cigarette packs from dark green to a more neutral color to better match the clothing trends of the time. The company refused, so Bernays encouraged French fashion designers to create their new lines in dark green to popularize the color. Then he had American Tobacco anonymously sponsor a charity ball at which the color theme was green. The hit of the evening? Dark green packs of Lucky Strikes, of course. The event, covered in all the society columns, was a success and helped establish green as a fashionable color. 45
Hiroshima Atomic Bomb Press Release in 1945. Click Here for a photograph of the actual news release.
PR nightmare for McNeil Labs and Johnson & Johnson over Tylenol case in 1982. In 1982, Johnson and Johnson discovered that some bottles of its Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules had been laced with cyanide. By the end of the crisis, seven people had died.How Johnson and Johnson dealt with this situation set a new precedent for crisis management.The company was lauded for its quick response and sincere concern for its consumers. Faced with tough decisions that would severely impact the future of his company, CEO James Burke immediately turned to the company's mission statement. Written by Robert Johnson in 1943, the document defines the focus of the company as its customers. Based on this credo, Tylenol used the media to promptly begin alerting people of the potential dangers of the product. It dispatched scientists to determine the source of the tampering. Johnson and Johnson then made a decision that would set a new standard for crises involving product tampering. The company ordered a massive recall of more than 31 million bottles at a cost of more than $100 million.46 It also stopped all production of capsules and replaced them with more tamper-resistant caplets. This level of response had never been attempted before, and resulted in much criticism from investors. However, Johnson and Johnson stood firm behind its decision - and for good reason.The company was able to "use the crisis to demonstrate to its customers its commitment to customer safety and to the quality of the Tylenol product." 47 Despite the initial losses, Johnson and Johnson regained and exceeded its previous market share within months of the incident.
Exxon Valdez runs aground in Prince William Sound, Alaska, causing the largest oil spill in US history in 1989. In 1989, the Exxon Corporation caused one of the worst environmental disasters ever. The Exxon Valdez oil tanker ran aground, spilling 250,000 barrels, an amount equal to more than 10 million gallons, of oil into Alaska's Prince William Sound. Efforts to contain the spill were slow and Exxon's response was even slower. The incident would go down in crisis management history as a textbook case of how not to respond during a crisis. "By the time the media was finished, the Exxon name was synonymous with environmental catastrophe." 48 It took company officials nearly 10 hours after the accident to deploy booms to contain the spill. In addition, Exxon was criticized for refusing to acknowledge the extent of the problem, which was due, in part, to the advice of company lawyers. To make matters worse, company executives refused to comment on the accident for almost a week. The biggest criticism the company received was the fact that CEO Lawrence Rawl waited six days to make a statement to the media and that he did not visit the scene of the accident until nearly three weeks after the spill. These actions left the public impression that the Exxon Corporation did not take this accident seriously. Initially, Exxon blamed state and federal officials for the delays in containing the spill. When asked how Exxon intended to pay the massive cleanup costs, one executive responded by saying it would raise gas prices to pay for the incident. Ten days after the spill, Exxon spent $1.8 million to take out full-page ad in 166 papers.50 In the ad, the company apologized for the spill but still refused to accept responsibility. Many consumers saw this approach as insincere and inadequate. Exxon paid the price for its actions in several different ways. The cleanup effort cost the company $2.5 billion alone, and Exxon was forced to pay out $1.1 billion in various settlements. A 1994 federal jury also fined Exxon an additional $5 billion for its "recklessness," which Exxon later appealed.51
A syringe is discovered in a can of Pepsi; Pepsi responds by calling for direct and immediate action in 1993. On June 10, 1993, an elderly couple claimed that they had discovered a syringe floating inside a can of Diet Pepsi. For the next two weeks, the management of Pepsi-Cola worked round the clock to mount a massive public relations campaign. Media relation executives used television to launch offense strategies. One video release illustrated the high-speed can-filling lines, eliminating the public's fear of an unsafe canning process. Another pictured a woman who was caught at a convenience store inserting her own syringe into an open Diet Pepsi can. Pepsi cooperated fully with the FDA and its investigative efforts. On June 21, 1993, Commissioner Kessler held a press conference calling the Pepsi-Cola controversy a hoax. Pepsi administrators then placed ads in newspapers and periodicals that read, "Pepsi is pleased to announce…nothing." 52
Anheuser-Busch issues a news release announcing a public-service campaign against driving under the influence of alcohol in 1999. In an effort to build on a US Department of Transportation study that showed that drinking and driving are on the decline, Anheuser-Busch launched a public service campaign against drunk driving. A company news release announced the program: St. Louis, MO -
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