The Odwalla corporation, a fruit juice producer based in California has always been a staunch supporter of natural products, though sadly those natural products created a deadly risk to at least 71 people in the fall of 1996. The company was linked to a large number of products containing apple juice that was tainted by the deadly e-coli O157:H7 bacteria. The death of a 16-month-old child in Evans, Colorado was the first of many illnesses that were directly linked to the company's products, most of which contained tainted apple juice. In fact the company ended up recalling 70% of its total product on the shelves in the United States and Canada. (Mogel, 2002, p. 222) The outbreak had been swift and the company is often praised for its quick and particularly humanitarian response to the situation. The marketing campaign they embarked on with the help of a marketing crisis management team is actually award winning.

             At the time of the crisis, Odwalla appeared to do everything right. It responded to what it called a freak occurrence by pulling the suspect juice and offering to pay medical expenses. The quick recall and its warm and fuzzy image prompted favorable comparisons with Johnson and Johnson for its handling of the Tylenol incident. (Entine, 1998, at: http://www.about-ecoli.com/news/odwalla16.htm) .

             The initial response to the problem is crucial to the marketing arena as it is a way in which businesses can see in a recent strategic situation the ways in which marketing can affect crisis management positively for a company in dire straits. Though the eventual court rulings and the findings of an inquiry did not match the public personification associated with the crisis marketing it did save the company from almost sure disaster that would likely lead to the company folding in disgrace. Certainly if the information that was discovered during the investigation, made by the courts had been available to the public during the crisis the company and its founders would have lost everything.