Surviving the Heat: Mastering Crisis Management in the Paqui One Chip Challenge

Paqui, the chip company, hit gold with their “one chip challenge”. The challenge went extremely viral on social media, especially with teens. Many audacious people were trying the challenge. They had to eat this one chip and avoid drinking or eating anything after it for a certain amount of time. The chip was a Carolina Reaper chip. The Carolina Reaper is the hottest pepper in the world, so you can start to see why it attracted risk-takers and content creators.

The Incident:

Harris Wolobah, a 14-year-old boy from Massachusetts died. His death had a strong correlation to the one-chip challenge that he attempted. The chip was meant for adult consumption but was extremely popular among teens. This caused outrage on social media. Many people were extremely skeptical about the chip and the company in general.

Paqui’s Response:

Paqui in response pulled the chip from the market. Although many people still sell the leftover one-chip challenges that they had, Paqui themselves no longer sell them. Not only that, they made a public apology about the incident: “We care about all of our consumers and have made the decision to remove the product from shelves,” Paqui spokesperson Kim Metcalfe told USA TODAY.

The decision to pull the “One Chip Challenge” chips from store shelves this week comes after the company saw an “increase in teen usage” of the product, Metcalfe said. The move by the Austin, Texas-based company is voluntarily, and is not a recall, she said. The company’s website also says it made the decision out of “an abundance of caution,” noting the individually wrapped “One Chip Challenge” product adhered to food safety standards.

“We are actively working with our retailers and are offering refunds for any purchases of our single-serve one chip challenge product,” Metcalfe said in the statement.”

After that, Paqui launched an investigation into how their adult product made it into the hands of teens so easily and why it became so popular with teens in general.

Analyzing the Response:

Paqui managed the crisis very well. After one death they immediately removed the product from shelves despite the fact that it was a massive hit. Not only that, they apologized for it. They are promising to do better in the future. Things happen, but it’s how companies deal with it that matters. I think Paqui helped their brand image with their response. They never intended to hurt anyone (the product was meant for adults) and when it did they did everything they could to make sure it did not happen again. I am not sure if the brand could have avoided this incident. When something goes extremely viral, people want in. Because of that I personally think that the only way to have avoided this would have been to not launch the challenge in the first place. Overall, Paqui had an amazing reaction to the horrible death caused by their product. Paqui did not care about their viral success but instead cared for the consumers by being honest, apologetic, taking steps to rectify the incident, and promising to do better. That’s what all companies should do.