Emerging Risk Identification in the Age of Social Media
In recent years, a recurring discussion within the food industry concerning the use of a processed ground beef product became national news. How? A blog post announcing the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s intent to purchase the product for use in school lunches led to an online petition at Change.org and subsequently elevated the discussion from a relative non-issue to national news. Over the course of three 3 months, one main manufacturer closed three of its facilities, another company was bankrupt, multiple lawsuits had been filed and a food product that had never been associated with incidence of foodborne illness had been demonized.
In 2013, another blog post advocating the removal of Yellow Dye No.’s 5 and 6 in a popular children’s food product led to more national media attention, followed by an outpouring of public support, ultimately resulting in the removal of those ingredients from some well-established and popular food products. While these two incidents involved different products, their progressions from benign to brand damaging were similar. Fueled by online dissent and propagated by social media, these serve as exemplars of how quickly a company can encounter a risk crisis.