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Last Updated: Aug 28, 2009 - 10:45:21 AM |
What Are The Risks? What WERE They Thinking?
They're everywhere, hawking anything from indoor grills to outdoor gear, looking you straight in the eye and assuring you that "whenever they go (your activity here), they'd never go without (product here)."
They are celebrity endorsers, and these days, it seems everyone has a "celebrity" attached to their products. The logic is simple: if someone identifies with a celebrity, they will buy the products that celebrity uses.
Joe Namath wore panty hose and sold aftershave.
Lebron James and Shaquille O'Neal star in their own mini-movies (but for the life of me I can't remember what either are selling).
Julius (Dr. J) Erving and Chelsey Grammer tell us to drink our doctor -Dr. Pepper - slowly. "Trust me," says Grammer, with the same sly smile that probably convinced Eve to try apples, "I'm a doctor."
Some marketing execs call it the "NASCAR effect" fans love a driver and buy the products on his car because they believe sponsor dollars will keep him racing. Pure marketing voodoo.
But bringing your celebrity and a product, by association, to the front-page, can be like the legendary Woody Hayes explaining his hatred of the forward pass. "One of three things happens every time you pass the football," Hayes said, "two of them are bad."
Sometimes, celebs crash and burn, turning from dubious asset to obvious liability. It can be anything from a thoughtless comment to a murder charge, but the impact is the same: the celeb commits the offense and their sponsors bear the consequences.
Sometimes the damage just a bump to the corporate pride (think John Daly being hauled out of Hooters recently). At others, however, it's the stinging outrage of consumers who vow they will never, ever, under any circumstance, buy your products, then back that up by canceling orders worth millions of dollars.
That kind of offense can turn a name from a noun to a verb, and that verb into a synonym for "toxic".
Yet the American fixation with celebrity continues, and many companies race headlong into endorsements.
That potential for disaster is always there - especially if you don't consider why someone is known.
Just before the Thanksgiving holiday, I learned that yet another company might be headed for a marketing nightmare. This time, it seems the company didn't recognize the distinction between "known" and "notorious".
H-S Precision is a South Dakota company that manufacturers rifles and rifle components. They're so confident in their products that they offer a 3-shot group that's guaranteed 1/2 MOA at 100 yards (30 caliber or smaller). Their customers range from hunters who want light, accurate rifles to military and law enforcement snipers.
It seems, however, H-S Precision has missed the mark - badly - in their choice of endorsements.
On the back cover of their latest catalog is what appears to be a rather innocuous recommendation of H-S products by a mid-level FBI bureaucrat. But the letter is evoking strong responses by some outraged shooters.
Some watershed moments in American history evoke strong emotions. 9/11 can represent either the moment of perfect evil visited on America or the resiliency of the American spirit.
Others have no positive redeeming quality. One of those is Ruby Ridge.
That unfortunate event has become what then- FBI Director Louis Freeh described as "synonymous with the exaggerated application of federal law enforcement".
For many hard-core shooters, anyone associated with the event is toxic.
The author of that seemingly innocuous letter on the H-S catalog may be the most toxic of them all.
Lon Horiuchi, the "FBI Program Manager and COTR" who wrote the H-S Precision endorsement was the sniper who fired the shot that killed Vicki Weaver during that 1992 standoff. Although charged with manslaughter, he was never prosecuted. A year later, Horiuchi was also involved in the Waco siege in 1993, sealing his linkage to two of the worst examples of excessive use of force by law enforcement in recent history.
The internet kicked off the controversy, with bloggers asking "what in the hell are they thinking" (H-S Precision).
>From there, the story has spread with protests reaching companies that use H-S Precision components.
One senior executive told me his company had already received "dozens" of emails concerning the use of H-S Precision parts. As to the tone of the emails: "none of them were happy."
Reading the blogs and message boards across the shooting community, it seems some readers are hoping that this is nothing more than an unfortunate gaffe.
One comment reminded readers Horiuchi never represented himself as anything other than the FBI official tasked in the selection of new precision rifle. And, another wrote, Horiuchi may be widely reviled, he was never convicted of wrongdoing. In fact, he retired from the FBI in October 2006.
But the ripples continue to spread.
As this new week begins, it's doubtful that anyone at H-S Precision anticipated the kind of greetings awaiting them after a weekend set aside for thanksgiving.
It's pretty safe to presume one of the questions they'll be answering, repeatedly, will be: "what were you thinking?"
We'll keep you posted.
--Jim Shepherd
http://www.shootingwire.com
http://www.theoutdoorwire.com
© Copyright 2008 by DOWN RANGE TV
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