Fabulosa’s Instagram Claim Proves Brands Likely to Cancel Crop, too | Commentary and opinion

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The term cancel culture is typically used when celebrities make a public faux pas. But what about when brands fall victim to social media backlash?

This is exactly what happened to cleaning brand Fabulosa, which recently suffered an avalanche of abuse after an Instagram user claimed one of the brand’s spray cans caught fire in their sink. , causing burns to his face and a two-hour stint in A&E.

The woman in question deleted the post after refusing to speak to the brand’s customer service team, Fabulosa co-founder and CEO James Sharpe said in an interview with The Grocer this week. But the damage was already done. Shortly after the post was published, a Change.org campaign urged retailers to remove Fabulosa products from stores. It received 1,317 signatories.

This shows the growing power of social media in the complaint process. The customer service hotline is no longer the first port of call, or even the second. Consumers share their negative experiences publicly on Facebook and Twitter, allowing them to circulate quickly whether the claims are founded or not.

Even so-called positive messages can turn out to be damaging. In the case of Fabulosa, a TikTok user shared a cleanup hack that involved spraying one of the Shock Can aerosols on the back of a radiator to remove dust. It’s not something Fabulosa would recommend, but the message quickly gained traction. A month later, another TikTok user warned that his attempt to replicate the hack resulted in a massive fireball explosion. Fabulosa has since responded, urging consumers not to use its products in this way.

The lesson for Fabulosa is to extinguish these fires literally or metaphorically before they even start. Sharpe admits it was a mistake not to act on the claims sooner. So Fabulosa now has a team member who diligently monitors all social media platforms for potentially dangerous hacks or claims, on a daily basis.

Of course, this does not completely eliminate the danger. Even if the team stumbles upon a problematic post, the best they can do is report it to the platform in question, ask the user to remove it, and post a response advising subscribers not to. try it out.

But at the very least, Fabulosa can take active steps to minimize the damage. And then he can truly embody the spirit of the song that accompanies his advertisements: I do not regret anything.

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