Recently, McDonald’s had an E. coli outbreak linked to contaminated ingredients–likely its slivered onions–resulting in several cases of illness among customers. While the situation is a crisis for McDonald’s, it also is a crisis for its competitors.
In your crisis communications plan, it is important to prepare for when a negative incident happens to another company in your industry, regardless if you are directly affected. The reasoning is that if the incident can happen to one company, it can happen to all of them.
That’s why Burger King, Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut, among others, all issued statements, each responding with measures to address the potential risks. Burger King reported that although most of its locations did not receive onions from the same supplier’s facility, about 5% of its restaurants did, prompting the chain to dispose of and replace onions in those locations as a precaution. Meanwhile, Yum! Brands, which owns Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut, also removed onions from affected restaurants in select areas until the investigation concludes.
As another example, after the United Airlines incident in which a passenger was forcibly removed after the flight was oversold, its competitors reacted accordingly. Southwest Airlines announced it would stop overbooking flights altogether, Delta Air Lines increased the maximum compensation for passengers voluntarily giving up seats and American Airlines began limiting the circumstances under which passengers could be removed from a flight once boarded.
What all of these companies are doing is preemptively taking actions to avoid a similar situation from occurring and subsequently maintaining trust with their stakeholders (e.g., customers, shareholders, etc.). It’s easy to understand why a person who eats at McDonald’s may be hesitant to eat at Burger King, for example.
Thus, remember that a crisis doesn’t always originate from an incident involving your company. As you can see, an incident external to your business can still negatively affect you.