BulletProofBlog the blog on crisis communications

Early on the morning of June 24, thousands of people across the country lined up to be among the first to purchase Apple’s iPhone 4. Having generated a level of mania usually associated with top rock concerts, the power of the brand built on iMacs, iPods, and iPads was on full display. But when those eager consumers took to their computers that same day to voice rampant displeasure with the iPhone 4’s now well-documented antenna reception ... READ MORE

In 1998, 16-month-old Danny Keysar was killed after his crib at a Chicago-area day care facility collapsed. When his parents learned that the crib had been recalled five years earlier, they were understandably outraged. The day care provider had no idea the crib had been recalled. Neither did the parent who had donated it. An underlying cause of the problem that led to Danny Keysar’s death is called “recall fatigue.” With tens of millions of products ... READ MORE

A story in The Economist last week detailed a now-famous 2008 protest that took place at the London headquarters of Unilever. Greenpeace activists outraged with the company’s use of palm oil in its products dressed as orangutans and scaled its corporate office building, disrupted business, and displayed banners condemning Unilever for damaging the ecosystem. The publicity stunt won widespread media attention and it wasn’t long before the company was forced to commit to obtaining palm oil ... READ MORE

Once again, allegations of poor working conditions overseas are creating major reputation problems for big brand names based in the United States. Ten years ago, it was Nike, The Gap and other high-profile apparel manufacturers that found themselves confronting charges of “sweatshop” labor practices in developing countries. Today, the claims have gone high-tech. A Chinese contractor producing iPhones and iPads for Apple, computers for Dell, and other products for major electronics companies is grappling with the ... READ MORE

In 2010, any disaster response communications effort that lacks a digital component isn’t built for a world in which Web resources are the most trusted and widely-read media of the day. As ongoing containment and clean-up efforts in the Gulf continue, that’s a fact clearly not lost on the Deepwater Horizon Unified Command. While www.deepwaterhorizonresponse.com appears to have been hastily designed and the navigation leaves something to be desired (understandable shortcomings under the present circumstances), the ... READ MORE

While the massive oil spill making its way towards America’s Gulf Coast is the most high profile incident to impact BP’s environmentally-friendly “Beyond Petroleum” positioning, it certainly isn’t the first. In 2007, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) hit BP with a largest-ever fine for alleged violations of the Clean Air Act. In 2006, a corroded BP pipeline was found to have spilled more than 250,000 gallons of oil into Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay. And in 2000, ... READ MORE

In this regular feature, Bulletproof interviews top plaintiffs' attorneys for their perspective on the crises likely to affect businesses in the near future. Today, as Deepwater Horizon lawsuits continue to mount in number and scope, we speak to Kurt Arnold, of Houston’s Arnold & Itkin LLP. Mr. Arnold has filed a case, Burkeen v. Transocean, in county court in Galveston, Texas, seeking unspecified damages on behalf of rig workers Joshua Kritzer, Bill Johnson, and Nick Watson, ... READ MORE

Last week, when it seemed that the environmental impacts of an oil rig explosion off Louisiana’s coast were on their way to being contained, I wrote in this space about the need for British Petroleum (BP) to aggressively communicate the steps it had taken, and would continue to take, to protect the people and wildlife of the Gulf Coast region. Since then, the situation has deteriorated – both in the Gulf and in the media, ... READ MORE

When ash from an erupting Icelandic volcano disrupted air travel across Europe earlier this month, more than five million passengers found themselves in the same boat – booking hotel rooms and buying meals that would make their extended stays just a little more bearable. But when it came time to pay for these basic necessities, some travelers had expenses covered by their airlines, while others were forced to fend for themselves. That’s because laws governing passengers’ ... READ MORE

On Tuesday night, when an explosion rocked and subsequently sank a Deepwater Horizon floating oil rig off the Louisiana coast, the timing couldn’t have been worse. Just as Americans are beginning to warm to the idea of expanded off-shore drilling, opponents of such a shift in the nation’s energy policy have been handed a damning talking point in their favor – and powerful visuals to go along with it. But to its credit, British Petroleum (BP), ... READ MORE