Crisis in Toyota

The first manufacturer of cars in the world, Toyota, has not started very well this year. The owner of the company, Akio Toyoda, has had to apologise for the problems of the accerelator in his cars, appear in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) the last month and check approximately 9 millions of cars around the world. The next video explains perfectly the problem and the consequences for the company.

In 2008, some clients in Europe and EEUU complained about problems with the accelerators of their cars, since the accelerator pedal did not return to the initial position when the drivers stopped to accelerate, so it was impossible to control the car. This fault could be the reason of 34 deaths in car accidents in EEUU.

How did Toyota manage the crisis situation? They did not do anything until four weeks ago when the owner of the company apologised after two weeks that the crisis broke and they published one video in YouTube.

Last month one article of the PRWeek analized the video, and another one the attitude of the company in this situation and they described it like a "easygoing attitude" and "incredibly reactive". Moreover, they advise to Toyota to change the PR vision of the company, since I think that in these kind of cases is necessary to speak with the media as soon as possible to explain the problem and give a solution if it is possible, not wait two weeks when the image of the company has just suffered.

But Toyota has not only this problem, the brakes of the Toyota Prius has caused one car accident with two injured and a lot of driver´s complains, how is Toyota going to react in view of this new crisis?

Image: www.autodescuento.com

Was it a real press conference?

Three months after the car accident, Tiger Woods did his first press conference to speak about the sexual scandal, is it not a lot of time of waiting? I think that it would be better after the hospital to speak with the media and say the thruth, because in theses three months the journalists only received rumours and wrote about speculations and the lovers´stories of Tiger. Would be better attack the theme in the first days?

In the press conference Tiger did not allow questions and only three wire reporters were in the room. Is it a real press conference or only a speech? In think that he lost a good opportunity to finish this theme because, is it better receive these kind of questions in his first appearance in a golf court?

After looking the video of the press conference several times, it seems like a speech of a politician, everything is too prepare, I can not see any feelings. For me, it was only his firts step to come back to a golf court, starting with the appearance again in the media and trying to achieve new sponsors and recover old ones, promising that he will be the perfect sportman, husband, father, son, etc., again, this that the companies want to their image.

Is this a good example of how to behave in a crisis case? For me definitely no.

Picture: Mundo52