Good Good Golf has become an example of how not to react in a crisis, according to PR professionals.
Good Good Golf has announced that CEO Matt Kendrick and President Joe Flannery have left the creator-led golf brand, following the dismissal of VP of Brand and Marketing Jeffrey Lefkovits.
The three departures are the latest consequences of an advert that showed Good Good Co-founder Garrett Clark pushing colleague Alexis Miestowski to the ground to prevent her from touching a Callaway driver.
The video, which was intended as a light-hearted reference to the horror film Obsession and the online trend it inspired, was removed following criticism that it made light of violence against women.
Callaway, which approved the advert, ended its partnership with the brand and pledged $1m to organisations supporting victims and working to prevent violence against women.
Good Good then announced it would withdraw as title sponsor of the PGA Tour event in Austin scheduled for November and several retailers, such as Dick’s Sporting Goods, have removed its products from stores.
Following the latest departures, Alex Puchala, Head of Finance and Operations at Good Good, described it as a “difficult day for the entire Good Good family”. However, it’s the amount of time that the crisis has run on for that has PR professionals questioning their strategy.
Each new development has generated another round of headlines, meaning a controversy which teed off with one advert has escalated.
When the response becomes the crisis
Insider Sport asked Sam Kane, Founder and CEO of SKX Communications, if he thinks the scale of Good Good’s response has been proportionate to the original crisis, but he says the answer depends on whether the advert is judged in isolation or with the company’s handling of the fallout.
“They had the opportunity to get the response right and, bluntly, both brands just got it so wrong – to the extent that it just ran and ran,” Kane tells Insider Sport.
He adds that companies facing significant reputational problems have one opportunity to show they understand what went wrong and evidence what will change. However, in Good Good’s case, the repeated statements kept the controversy alive.
“You are just pouring gasoline on the flames and there is no way this is going to be extinguished overnight,” he says. “It just spiralled when it really didn’t have to.”
Fredrik Jonsson, SVP of Reputation at The PHA Group, also believes the issue was less about the eventual scale of the response and more about its timing.
“This is actually a point around timing and sequencing rather than scale. Good Good’s mistake was not to take decisive action from the very outset,” he says. “Instead, the saga has turned into a series of interventions in an effort to tackle each previous criticism. Leading to an attritional outcome.”
Jonsson says the point at which media attention switches from the initial controversy to the company’s handling of it is especially damaging.
“The game is effectively up the moment coverage begins to focus on how you are handling the fallout. Rather than the original crisis itself,” he explains.
Lauren Shelley, Senior Digital PR Executive at Marketing Signals, also points to the staggered nature of the response.
“When exits come through gradually over several weeks rather than all at once, it can start to feel like the story is still unfolding rather than resolved, even if that’s not necessarily the intention,” she tells Insider Sport.
“A crisis response starts doing more damage than the original incident once it looks less about fixing the problem and more about managing the fallout.”
Where creator culture clashes with corporate
As mentioned in this week’s Partnership Playbook, brands want the personality, cultural relevance and audience creators can provide, but creator-led content doesn’t always match the standards expected of major corporate partners.
Good Good’s advert was based on an online trend, but Kane states the brand was late to the cultural moment it was attempting to capitalise on.
“One thing that got overlooked that really rankled at me is that they said this was a pastiche of the horror film Obsession,” he tells Insider Sport.
“This was a film with a tiny budget that blew up earlier this year. But it was out about four months ago, all the memes and reactive marketing were in May. We are now in September.”
Kane compared it with brands attempting to capitalise on the Barbie phenomenon long after the film had dominated popular culture.
“It was reminiscent of some brands bringing pink things out months after Barbie had aired in the cinema three years ago. You’ve got to move at the speed of culture,” he says.
Finding a Good Good ending to the crisis
The current challenge, which may be easier said than done, is stopping the leadership changes from becoming another stage in an ongoing story. Jonsson believes the departures of Kendrick and Flannery provide Good Good with an opportunity to do just that.
“Today’s announcement that both the CEO and President of Good Good Golf have left their roles ought to draw a line under the crisis,” he explains to Insider Sport.
“With new leadership in place, an acknowledgement of the lessons learnt and a focus now on getting back to what Good Good Golf does best, which is make content for its followers, should stop the story rumbling on.”
Shelley says the next stage should focus less on another statement and more on demonstrating what has actually changed inside the company.
She suggests Good Good could help rebuild confidence by explaining how the advert was developed and approved, in addition to showing that the leadership changes form part of a wider internal response.
“To move forward, the conversation needs to move on from who’s leaving to what’s actually being put right,” she adds.
Kane seconds this point, adding that Good Good should learn about the severity and sensitivity of domestic violence and use its audience to support greater awareness and stay away from treating donations or public statements as evidence that lessons have been learned.
“The brands that DO, don’t just SAY, are the ones that gain real reputational kudos,” he concludes.
