How fragile is your brand?
"It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it." So says the Oracle of Omaha, Warren Buffet.
There's much truth to this phrase, and much evidence, especially in the news. But methinks it applies much much less to brands than to people.
Take Dieselgate™. Things backfired for VW in September 2015, when regulators discovered that 11 million VW diesel cars only ran clean in a stealth "emissions test mode." Otherwise they belched 40 TIMES more pollution than allowed.
VW stock fell almost 40%. The CEO resigned. It cost $7Bn to fix it. Fines, recalls, lawsuits, and a massive PR black eye. Yeowch.
"They'll never recover!" many said.
Today? Sales are sky-high. Their electric tech is booming. And with a 7-year bumper-to-bumper warranty, even I felt enough trust in them to buy a VW.
Yes, it cost them in the short-term. Yes, they did a lot of the right things to recover.
But like Nike and Chipotle and others before them (& since), VW has recovered.
Seems that 70 years of brand building doesn't just evaporate overnight.
And consumers are more forgiving — and more forgetful — than we think.