Taco Bell's Swift Initiatives

The objective of this case is to understand the importance of crisis management. This case is intended to make the reader consider not only financial implications at the time of the event but the effects on the long term strategies of the organization. Also, the case urges participants to think about the consequences not only on the customer but on those within the organization as well.

were branded to the bone. They always understood that they were selling brands before product. They had their eyes fixed on global expansion.

Chipotle inappropriately handled this crisis because CEO Steve Ells and Co-CEO Monty Moran blamed the Center for Disease Control and the media for exaggerating the outbreak. Creating a public perception of Chipotle’s board members who did not showcase a clear motive for public health safety. After the E. coli outbreak, Moran made statements to Chipotle’s investors at an industry conference: “The media likes to write sensational headlines, you’ll probably see, you know, when somebody sneezes, Ah, it’s E. coli from Chipotle” (Colvin, 2015). Moran made another statement on Twitter ‘saying’ “CDC is working in an unorthodox way” (Wohl, 2015). Moran’s arrogant comments reflected a quality of an unconcerned CEO in the eyes of the public. In one of

Chipotle is in the fast food segment, where setting up a food joint is easy. And acquiring suppliers and buyers is also relatively easy. But industries like these essentially work on customer trust and support. It is a rare case of how one small event can tarnish a company’s reputation overnight. It was probably something out of a nightmare for Chipotle’s employees when E. Coli was discovered in their food ingredients and discouraged customers to visit Chipotle stores. This also hit their stocks, and they never quite recovered from the downfall. Chipotle’s motto of serving food with dignity is something they have always stood by and adhered to. Thus, they wouldn’t have compromised on anything. (1) After initial trouble, which started in the summer of 2015, things have now relatively calmed down and Chipotle is doing marketing at an unprecedented level. Industries which are hit by health problems, rarely recover this fast. Its stocks and market reputation is bound to go down.

Chipotle’s apologetic response strategy is reminiscent of the 2008 McCain Maple Leaf Foods listerios epidemic known as one of the worst contamination cases in Canadian history. Similarly, Maple Leaf Foods opted for a high visibility strategy immediately responding by posting an apology video on their YouTube channel after news broke of the first death connected to the outbreak. Here the company’s CEO not only took full responsibility and offered his sincere sympathy for those customers whose lives were effected, but ensured the public that necessary actions were going to be taken regardless of financial costs. McCain’s continued visibility was seen as the CEO Michael H. McCain appearing in television advertisements, holding press conferences, and on the corporate website continuing to apology for the dire

The first 48 hours after the outburst of crisis is the prime time to reduce destruction of the crisis and restore the reputation of the corporation, so when to react and how to react are crucial for crisis communication. As for the Nuance case, the company needs to take the following steps to deal with the crisis.

The main issues that Gupta’s focus should be on in regards to short term are the allegations from Center for Science and Environment (CSE) that threatens to tarnish the image of the company’s brand, and the survey result of the its consumers. Crisis is inescapable. When it does occur, for the most part, ones’ wish is for it to go away as fast as possible. While it is an uncomfortable dilemma; nonetheless one ought to have a plan in place to reconcile the issue. In this case study Gupta, president and CEO of Coca Cola India found himself in a crisis that could either conquer his company’s animation or redeem its success as the lead in India. According to Dolewski, the element of surprise should be incorporated into the role of managers due to the variation in the amount of a disaster warning. Bearing in mind Gupta had tactics in place in to dealing with desolations that results from crises, it will at least allow company managers to start from a resilient situation. The gift to identify short-term issues in crisis is an accomplishment but having a solution is an entirely different scenario.

From the onset, it is important to note that James and his vice president for production, John Healy, could have possibly prevented the scenario from escalating into a fully blown crisis by addressing the issue early enough. In my opinion, the company's top leadership should have acted during the second stage of the scenario, i.e. after concern deepened. The company's topmost executives instead chose to adopt the 'wait and see' stance.

The company I have chosen to base my assignment on is Taco Bell. It is a leading Mexican style fast-food chain serving tacos, burritos, signature quesadillas, Border Bowls®, nachos and other specialty items. Currently, Taco Bell serves more than 35million consumers each week in approximately 5,600 restaurants in the United States of America. It is recognized as the best Mexican fast-food chains in the United States of America (Yum! Brands, 2010). This fast-food chain plans on introducing its products in Malaysia.

Here, Taco Bell had a customer that started a crisis for their organization, by saying that the hamburger meat used in the ingredient was not real meat. Furthermore, the customer file a lawsuit against the organization. Here, when a crisis occur the first step is to convening with your crisis management team. However, maybe only one team member is present at this crisis, it is their job to assess casualty. Once this done the terms member will contact all other crisis member were they can meet to collaborate a plan for this crisis. If there are any human injury, this step in very important crisis team out to the family member that has love  one involved in this crisis. The organization should be the first one reach to the family this show that

Running a large company is a great responsibility, even at the most basic functioning level. You have to make sure operations are in order, your customers satisfied, your product flawless and your employee’s ae happy and valued. Thus, it is easily an overwhelming struggle to find time to manage the opinions of your audience and the general public. Yet, it is critical to the longevity and success of a company. Companies such as Under Armour, Southwest Airlines, television network TLC, and the NBA are just a handful of companies who have had major crisis within the communities they serve and have managed the situation extremely well. These companies responded swiftly and honestly and were able to maintain a strong loyal customer base even after some of the most unfortunate and unpredictable situations.

Unfortunately, the same issues that existed with the overall governance existed here. The company may have been acting as an exemplary corporate citizen, but with no overall strategy and minimal communication, there was no consistency or coordination, and the company was not getting the public relations benefits that they might have otherwise gained (Veleva, 2010).

Crisis communication is the most important aspect of external and internal organization communication. This type of communication ranges from image restoration campaigns to employee turnover. In the articles that I have analyzed, I discovered many examples of crisis communications and its importance. I will discuss the Bridgestone-Firestone Corporation's image restoration campaign and explain Benoit's theory of image restoration. Also, I will discuss how crisis communications fits into public relations models. Two examples for discussion will be how supervisors should convey bad-news to their employees, and group communication within employee turnover. My last example for this discussion will be Bill Clinton's image repair discourse.

Crisis is often a very fearful problem for organization around the world. As brand building takes up a very long period, destroying a brand on the other hand only require a blink of an eye. However, each and every organization will have their own module or particular ways to prevent their brand to have negative image in customers’ perception. But because of the unknown future, crisis might arise from nowhere and struck the organization with no mercy and brings the organization to an ending point. Crisis can be devastating as the effect of the crisis its own can sometimes be very hard to calculate as there might be many parties involved.

Managers and leaders do not welcome crises because they don't realize that problems and crisis if handled with intelligence become an opportunity for the company. The purpose of writing this paper to discuss the case of "Johnson & Johnson" that became a hero in the eyes of public (Rehak, 2002) and gained their market share back with the help of their effective public relations plan. They accomplished this by making good relations with public and by proving how much they were concerned about the safety of their consumers.