Bendgate 2014

It has been a less than joyful week for Apple.  By the close of the day on Thursday, the company’s shares had fallen by more than three percent. This descent in shares wiped close to $23 billion off of Apple’s overall stock market value (YIKES). Well, it’s all due to the release of the long-awaited iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, along with iOS 8.

The PR nightmare has slowly started ascending upon Apple ever since the iCloud hacking in August, which resulted in the release of several celebrities’ nude photos. Then came the unexpected download of the new U2 album, which surprisingly enough, not everyone wanted in their music library! Shocker. It all snowballed out of control when reports of a very glitchy iOS 8 and an unusually bendable iPhone 6 surfaced. Now being dubbed as Bendgate and iOSgate, it’s needless to say that Apple has a lot on its plate at the moment. The PR nightmare has officially come to life. 

Apple has taken several steps to correct the wrongs, but according to the three percent drop in share, it’s not enough. Apple did do one thing right; it pulled iOS 8 within the first hour of the release so that it could fix the bugs on the operating system. The tech giant has now released iOS 8.0.2, which has reportedly fixed the bugs that were in the previous version. Apple did not address the case of the bending iPhone, however, until a week after the story surfaced. This is a HUGE mistake on Apple’s part, in my opinion. Instead of apologizing for selling iPhones that bend, Apple defended against these reports by saying that warping is “extremely rare” through normal use. Granted, there are only nine reported cases of an iPhone bending, but Apple is essentially saying that it knows that it’s a problem and that it isn’t going to do anything to solve it.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want my phone to bend and break. Let alone a phone I’m paying upwards $600 for. Luckily, I am not someone that has purchased an iPhone 6, but if I had, I would be extremely upset over the matter. Apple is unknowingly sending the message that it simply does not care about a possibly huge problem with its product.

Unfortunately for Apple, the damage is done. When it comes to crisis management, the company’s response must be immediate. The weeklong response only added fuel to the fire. Additionally, if more reports of bent iPhones come in, they will have no choice but to fix it. This will make Apple look like a hypocrite, which is not a good look for any company. The company essentially tainted its own credibility by ignoring the problem, and Apple shareholders see this.

The PR team at Apple has a lot on their hands this upcoming week. If it does not reverse the negative attention that Apple has been receiving this past week, shares could possibly dip even further. I think we can all agree that this outcome would be no bueno for everyone.

I like Apple, and in no way is this a hate on Apple post, but it’s a clear cut example of how bad PR can instantly affect a company, no matter how big it is.