How did Tylenol engage with consumers after negative publicity?

Tylenol was the number one over-the-counter pain reliever in the United States. They had a steady following, and no primary competitors. As a mystery began to emerge in 1982 individuals were dying in what seemed to be random order, of all ages, all over the state of Illinois. There was no connection to the mysterious incidents except that they were in the same geographical region of the country, and upon further inspection, after the autopsy reports, were all said to have cyanide poisoning. Their relatives were gave testimony that all victims took a dose of Tylenol before they passed. The company determined the only possible explanation for the regrettable instances was from tampering after the capsules left the warehouse distributor. “Before the 1982 crisis, Tylenol controlled more than 35 percent of the over-the-counter pain reliever market; only a few weeks after the murders, that number plummeted to less than 8 percent”(Markel, Dr. Howard. How the Tylenol Murders of 1982 changed the way we consumer medication). This clearly had a huge impact on the consumer engagement with the brand, and effected their overall sales.

Johnson & Johnson came back with a campaign that was purely focused upon righting their wrongs. They publicly apologized for the unforgivable incident and invested a good portion of money into efforts of finding the culprit and bringing them to justice. They eventually found him and he was sentenced to 20 years in jail for his crimes.

With this public apology, as well as locating the individual responsible, Johnson & Johnson refocused their efforts on bringing their reputation back into the minds of their consumers. The real issue here lied in the safety of their product. They reinvented the product, from capsules to tablets. The brand offered for consumers to send in their old products to be replaced with the new product at no charge. This was not successful in reinventing their brand. They did however come up with a new packaging that was more secure and prevented any tampering with the bottle without the consumer becoming aware of it. This innovation was the spark that sent their consumer engagement back up to its original peak. The safety of their product was restored, and copied by their top competitors, and has now become how we buy over-the-counter pain killers today.

Markel, Dr. Howard. How the Tylenol Murders of 1982 changed the way we consumer medication. Sept 29, 2014. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/tylenol-murders-1982

Caesar-Gordon, Andrew. PR Week. The Perfect Crisis Response? https://www.prweek.com/article/1357203/perfect-crisis-response