• Skip to Content
  • Skip to Main Navigation
  • Skip to Information Links
  • Skip to Site Search
  • Skip to Footer
  • Skip to Accessibility Information
  • Home Page

Information Links

Haymarket Marketing Communications:

  • PRWeek
  • Campaign US
  • MM+M
  • 30-Day Trial
  • Register
  • Sign in
  • Search
  • Menu
  • US|
  • UK|
  • Middle East|
  • Asia

PR Week Global

  • Menu
  • Search

Main Navigation

Menu

Main Navigation

  • US|
  • UK|
  • Middle East|
  • Asia
  • News
      News
    • Agency
    • Breakfast Briefing
    • Consumer
    • Corporate
    • Healthcare
    • Media
    • Public Affairs
    • Technology
    Show
  • In-depth
      In-depth
    • Agency Business Report
    • Power List
    • Crisis Corner
    • Newsmakers
    • Women of Distinction
    • Bellwether Survey 2022
    • Hall of Fame
    • 40 Under 40
    • Salary Survey
    • Health Influencer 30
    • Best Places to Work
    • Career Guide
    Show
  • People in PR
      People in PR
    • Hall of Fame archive
    • Opinion
    • Newsmakers
    • Steve Barrett on PR
    • Don Spetner
    • Dashboard 25
    • Around the office
    • Pride in PR
    • CEO Focus
    • CMO Focus
    • Femme Forward
    • Pets in PR
    Show
  • Resources
      Resources
    • Ebooks
    • Digital Editions
    • Agency Business Report
    • Salary Survey
    • Campaign Case Studies
    • Bellwether Survey 2022
    • Cannes 2022
    • Dashboard
    • Podcasts
    • Webinars
    • Places to Be 2022
    • Contact Directory
    • Jobs
    • Renew
    • Subscribe
    Show
  • Events
      Events
    • Crisis Comms Conference
    • PRWeek US Awards
    • PRWeek 40 Under 40
    • Women of Distinction
    • PRDecoded
    • PRWeek Global Awards
    • PRWeek Purpose Awards
    • Healthcare Conference + Awards
    • Hall of Fame
    • Brand Entertainment Awards
    • Webinars
    Show
  • Jobs
  • Directory
  • Agency
  • Breakfast Briefing
  • Consumer
  • Corporate
  • Healthcare
  • Media
  • Public Affairs
  • Technology

  • Trending :
  • Crisis Comms Conference
  • Best Places to Work
  • PRWeek Awards
  • Healthcare Conference + Awards
  • Women of Distinction

Partner content

In partnership with

NewsWhip

From Coca-Cola bans to Peloton recalls - the crises that shaped Q2

Through some high-profile examples, this 2021 NewsWhip special report drills deep into how various crises today – and the subsequent coverage and social engagement – impact brand reputation as never before.

by NewsWhip July 26, 2021

  • Share article on Twitter
  • Share article on Facebook
  • Share article on LinkedIn
While Cristiano Ronaldo’s removal of a Coca-Cola bottle from a Euro 2020 presser was covered eight times more than the North Carolina machine ban, it only garnered around double the social engagement.

What does a reputation crisis look like in 2021? How did the coverage of Peloton’s product recall compare to that of its API problems? How did the public react to the news?

NewsWhip is the leading provider of real-time and predictive media monitoring, and we’ve examined all of these questions and more in our latest special report on brand reputation for Q2 2021. 

In the report, we used a mix of public and media interest to examine various brand crises, looking at the length and drivers of some of the most headline-grabbing stories of the quarter. 

The full report looks at four different categories: ransomware attacks, product recalls, executives in the news, and politics impacting brands. Here, we’re going to highlight some of the most salient examples of product recalls, and brands getting pulled into politics. Let’s first look at Coca-Cola.

Spotlight: Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola has had a pair of different instances with the potential to damage the brand’s reputation this quarter, with one being a political moment.

Our Compare feature allows us to see how much these narratives were comparatively covered and resonant, by combining data for the number of stories they were written and the number of times they were liked, shared, or commented upon on the social web. This gives us a combined view of not only how much the media wrote about each, but also how much importance the public gave it.

The political situation was a North Carolina county voting to ban machines that sell Coca-Cola due to what it alleged was the company’s “woke politics.” Despite only being written about a little over 250 times, the articles covering this, which mostly came from conservative publications, received more than a million engagements. 

We can find a useful comparison in Cristiano Ronaldo’s removal of a Coca-Cola bottle from a press conference at Euro 2020, in which he told people to drink water. 

Although this was covered in the press around eight times as often as the North Carolina story, the engagements were only around double, which shows how much the machines being banned resonated amongst certain online communities. 

Product recall: Peloton

Peloton is another particularly interesting example of this, as it provides us with another chance to contextualize potential crises against each other for the same company.

After being warned by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission in April, Peloton finally issued recalls for two of its treadmill products in May of this year. 

The recalls were acknowledged in an earnings call, around the same time a potential data breach was exposed. The chart above examining the media and public interest in the two events makes it obvious that almost nobody paid attention to the data breach, which received 2.6k total engagements compared to the 126k engagements associated with the recalls. 

Even in the media, the difference was marked, with 110 articles written about the data breach compared to 2,700 about the recalls. Ars Technica had the most engaged coverage of the breach, noting that it had taken Peloton three months to fix the flaw in their API. 

These were just some of the challenges that brands faced in Q2, and our full report contains a number of other examples, from ransomware attacks to executives making the headlines for the wrong reasons. If you’re interested in the full report, you can download that here.


More...

  • The new frontier of earning attention: Why it doesn’t start with your brand

  • Media lists are dead; long live media targets

  • How do PR pros feel about AI and PR tech?

  • Are we there yet? Returning to the workplace post-pandemic

  • Measuring Impact: Connecting PR outcomes to business goals

Have you registered with us yet?

Register now to enjoy more articles and free email bulletins

Register
Already registered?
Sign in

Resources

  • The Future of Work

  • Dashboard 25

  • Crisis Comms Conference

  • Best Places to Work

  • PRWeek Awards US

  • Hall of Fame

  • Women of Distinction

  • Salary Survey

  • Health Influencer 30

  • Healthcare Conference + Awards

  • Purpose Awards

  • PRDecoded

  • Bellwether Survey

  • Changemakers

  • 40 Under 40

  • The Power List

  • Pride in PR

  • Brand Film Awards

  • Agency Business Report

  • Webinars

  • Find a Job

  • Podcasts

  • Subscribe to PRWeek

Resources

Up next:

A&W mascot Rooty, who is wearing blue jeans.

‘People got up in arms’: The inside story on A&W’s tweet parodying M&M’s

Trump in his first debate against Joe Biden in 2020. (Photo credit: Getty Images).

Advocacy groups decry Meta Trump reinstatement

Pfizer has not responded to requests for comment. (Photo credit: Getty Images).

What — if anything — does the Project Veritas COVID-19 mutation video mean for Pfizer?

The parameters are the result of work initiated by Twitter in December 2020. (Photo credit: Getty Images).

Twitter improves brand safety parameters as ad revenue craters

M&M’s spokes candy controversy is a Super Bowl stunt

M&M’s spokes candy controversy is a Super Bowl stunt

Breakfast Briefing: 5 things for PR pros to know on Friday morning

Breakfast Briefing: 5 things for PR pros to know on Friday morning

Palm Springs selects agency to push California destination

Palm Springs selects agency to push California destination

Why executives flame out

Why executives flame out

Boll & Branch is celebrating its 10th anniversary next year.

Boll & Branch names Diffusion AOR

Timeline of a crisis: Balenciaga stumbles as it walks back questionable campaign images

Timeline of a crisis: Balenciaga stumbles as it walks back questionable campaign images


JOIN, SHARE, LIKE, FOLLOW US ON:

  • f
  • t
  • I
  • l
  • yt
About PRWeek
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Editorial Calendar
  • Advertise
Subscribe
  • Subscribe to PRWeek
  • Newsletters
  • FAQ
Global
  • PRWeek UK
  • Campaign Asia
Haymarket © Haymarket Media Group Ltd. | Terms & Conditions | Cookie Notice | Privacy Notice | Cookie Settings
IPSO