Brand Failures

138 Brand failures
But Procter & Gamble dismissed this research as ‘insufficient data in the
hands of a bureaucracy.’
However, by this time the company had started to realize it was fighting a
losing battle and began to co-operate and look for a compromise solution.
Procter & Gamble suggested a warning label be added to the product. But
when the results of the CDC study were confirmed by an independent
research firm, Procter & Gamble had little choice but to suspend sales of the
product.
The withdrawal of Rely from the market was estimated to cost US $75
million. However, although Procter & Gamble initially made matters worse
by denying responsibility, the company was now embarked on a damage
limitation exercise.
It worked jointly with the CDC to draft a consent agreement. The CDC
allowed Procter & Gamble to deny any product defect or violation of federal
law. In return Procter & Gamble promised to buy back any unused product
and offered its scientific expertise to research the problem. The company also
mounted a large-scale educational campaign.
In an article for the Canadian Journal of Communication, Drexel University’s
Priscilla Murphy explored Procter & Gamble’s handling of the Rely
tampon incident in relation to ‘games theory’. She argued that by the end,
Procter & Gamble’s game plan had improved greatly:
The latter stages of Procter & Gamble’s strategy exemplify a wholly
different approach to conflict. What had begun as a classic escalation
game became a bargaining venture in which everyone’s desires were
examined and coordinated so that each player could live with the
agreement. When we are talking about bargaining games we are really
looking at the ways in which both sides in a conflict gradually come to
agree on a single version of events, a single perspective. What resulted
was a stable equilibrium point that, though not ideal, represented the
best outcome for each side given the pressures from the other side.
So although the incidents of toxic shock syndrome spelt the end of the Rely
brand, Procter & Gamble itself suffered small lasting damage and continues
to produce some of the world’s most popular tampon products.