Congratulations to the team at Subway, which managed to break its own record for earliest PR crisis. A lawsuit filed against the ubiquitous sandwich chain in mid-January alleges that the tuna it advertises is “not tuna and not even fish.”
Tim Carman at The Washington Post reports, “The star ingredient, according to the lawsuit, is ‘made from anything but tuna.’ Based on independent lab tests of ‘multiple samples’ taken from Subway locations in California, the ‘tuna is ‘a mixture of various concoctions that do not constitute tuna, yet have been blended together by defendants to imitate the appearance of tuna,’ according to the complaint.”
Subway has a long and distinguished history of PR crises, including:
- Its spokesman Jared Fogle was sentenced to 15 years in prison for child pornography and sex with minors
- A study found that the sandwich chain’s oven-roasted chicken is actually only 50 percent chicken.
- An Irish court ruled that the company’s sandwich rolls contained too much sugar to legally qualify as “bread”
- And, most dastardly, it was accused of serving “foot-long” sandwiches that were actually only 11.5″ long
Denver Public Relations Blog 