Everybody makes mistakes. But most of us are lucky enough not to have to do so on a global stage. If you’re running a huge company, though, you'd better make sure to dot all of your i’s and cross your t’s before unveiling something to the public. Otherwise, you might never live those failures down…
Redditors have recently been recalling some of the absolute worst PR disasters companies and individuals have been guilty of. From out-of-touch ad campaigns to slogans that definitely should not have gone to print, here’s a list of hilarious mistakes that might give you secondhand embarrassment. Enjoy scrolling through these botched PR moves, and be sure to upvote the ones you won’t ever forget!
#1
There's a local gay bar in the city where I'm from. Its the only gay bar really. They do drag shows, play different music and people can just be themselves there. A cornerstone of the nightlife in the city.
The first week of college is called "freshers week" and its usually a manic time to go out as people return for college or are starting a new chapter of their life. Big bucks for the pubs as you can imagine.
Drag queen heads into the pub to start getting ready for her show that evening....they are taking down everything in the bar. All the flags, art and other gay culture items in the place. Drag queen is like ehhh whats going on here? And gets told lol soz your show is cancelled indefinitely.
Nothing is worse than a Drag queen scorned and they find out the corporate overlords of the bar want to change it into a sports bar type place for freshers week. They hold a huge protest across the street in the pissing rain and the whole city sees. The new bar flops and a few smaller gay spots pop up as well as other pubs snatching up the Drag queens for brunches and other events.
That was in ~2023 and that huge cornerstone pub still lies vacant.
The first week of college is called "freshers week" and its usually a manic time to go out as people return for college or are starting a new chapter of their life. Big bucks for the pubs as you can imagine.
Drag queen heads into the pub to start getting ready for her show that evening....they are taking down everything in the bar. All the flags, art and other gay culture items in the place. Drag queen is like ehhh whats going on here? And gets told lol soz your show is cancelled indefinitely.
Nothing is worse than a Drag queen scorned and they find out the corporate overlords of the bar want to change it into a sports bar type place for freshers week. They hold a huge protest across the street in the pissing rain and the whole city sees. The new bar flops and a few smaller gay spots pop up as well as other pubs snatching up the Drag queens for brunches and other events.
That was in ~2023 and that huge cornerstone pub still lies vacant.
81points
#2
Remember when Elon Musk had his lead designer throw a steel ball at the Cybertruck windows to prove how strong it was and it broke both times? Luckily for them, the truck was so hideous that people actually focused more on its terrible design than the botched demonstration.
Kongbuck:
The worst part about that whole debacle is that the idea they were trying to demonstrate (laminated side windows in a car) is an incredibly bad idea. Unless you NEED armored windows for security reasons, having laminated windows on the sides prevents a rescuer from being able to smash the window to save you if you get into a wreck. Those escape hammers won't work from the inside if you accidentally drive into water either.
Kongbuck:
The worst part about that whole debacle is that the idea they were trying to demonstrate (laminated side windows in a car) is an incredibly bad idea. Unless you NEED armored windows for security reasons, having laminated windows on the sides prevents a rescuer from being able to smash the window to save you if you get into a wreck. Those escape hammers won't work from the inside if you accidentally drive into water either.
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74points
#3
Getting rid of the Taco Bell dog. The dog was a genius. The PR team…not so much.
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74points
#4
A Monsanto lobbyist goes on TV and claims Roundup is not harmful to humans, it's so safe you can drink it. Talkshow host pulls out a glass of Roundup for the lobbyist to drink since it perfectly safe. The lobbyist then refuses to drink it saying "I'm not drinking that, I'm not an idiot".
70points
#5
Hobby Lobby defending their decision to stay open during the Covid lockdowns by saying they were essential because they sold fabrics for mask making, and putting out a letter that said the founder's wife a had a vision from God that told her to keep stores open because God will weather us from the storm. Not a great way to spin it when many people already refuse to shop there because of the owner's wackadoodle beliefs, not using barcodes, and not to mention, smuggling Iraqui artifacts into the US, later having to pay a $3 million fine, and return everything back to Iraq.
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70points
#6
The US Army did a Twitter PR campaign for Memorial Day one year and it backfired tremendously. It asked “How did serving impact you?” along with a video of some poor PFC talking about how the Army made his life better.
The thread got tens of thousands of replies from vets and family members describing PTSD, losing loved ones, injuries, and how bad the VA and the Army had treated people coming back.
The Army ended up putting out a statement like “thanks for your sharing your real stories, we’re committed to your mental health blah blah blah.”.
The thread got tens of thousands of replies from vets and family members describing PTSD, losing loved ones, injuries, and how bad the VA and the Army had treated people coming back.
The Army ended up putting out a statement like “thanks for your sharing your real stories, we’re committed to your mental health blah blah blah.”.
61points
#7
When parker pen entered the mexican market, they had an ad that was supposed to say “it won’t leak in your pocket and embarrass you.” they mistakenly thought “embarazar” meant embarrass, but it means “to impregnate.” so, their ads told mexican customers the pen wouldn’t make them pregnant.
60points
#8
McDonald's CEO pretending to eat their new burger.
wino_whynot:
Product. He ate their new product.
viskoviskovisko:
It was taped. They didn’t have to release it. I don’t understand what they were thinking.
Ozzel:
The worst part is how he keeps talking about it. Like, dude, just shut up.
wino_whynot:
Product. He ate their new product.
viskoviskovisko:
It was taped. They didn’t have to release it. I don’t understand what they were thinking.
Ozzel:
The worst part is how he keeps talking about it. Like, dude, just shut up.
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57points
#9
Years ago, Scope mouthwash named Rosie O’Donnell one of the country’s “least kissable celebrities.”
She immediately started promoting Listerine on her show, even had people swilling it on camera, and every time one of her guests kissed her they’d donate $1,000 to charity.
Eventually, Scope tried to apologize and even took out a full page apology ad, but she kept up with her “Say nope to Scope” campaign and ended up with like $500K worth of charitable donations.
She immediately started promoting Listerine on her show, even had people swilling it on camera, and every time one of her guests kissed her they’d donate $1,000 to charity.
Eventually, Scope tried to apologize and even took out a full page apology ad, but she kept up with her “Say nope to Scope” campaign and ended up with like $500K worth of charitable donations.
57points
#10
Jake Paul hawking his own brand of antiperspirant then getting on stage having sweat through his suit jacket.
56points
#11
Bud Light managing to get both sides to boycott them was pretty epic PR bungling. Piss off Conservatives by hiring a Trans influencer for PR, then piss off Liberals & the LGBTQ+ by apologizing and pulling the ad. Now no one buys Bud Light. I think their sales are still down 30-40% from before the boycott.
sickwobsm8:
I know someone who worked in their sales dept and everyone was livid with the head of marketing. Basically vaporized what was an all but guaranteed bonus because of that campaign.
Enginerdad:
I think the boycott gave a lot of people the opportunity to realize how little Bud Light contributed to their lives. Even if they got over the outrage, there's no point in switching back to your original bubbly water alcohol once you've found a new bubbly water alcohol and realized they're all the same.
sickwobsm8:
I know someone who worked in their sales dept and everyone was livid with the head of marketing. Basically vaporized what was an all but guaranteed bonus because of that campaign.
Enginerdad:
I think the boycott gave a lot of people the opportunity to realize how little Bud Light contributed to their lives. Even if they got over the outrage, there's no point in switching back to your original bubbly water alcohol once you've found a new bubbly water alcohol and realized they're all the same.
41points
#12
P Diddy's Pepsi song! In 2006 Pepsi gave all this money to Diddy to make a new jingle and they made a super bowl commercial around it and everything and the song went "♫ Brown and Bubbly ♫"
Dude, brown and bubbly?! Who on the english-speaking earth doesn't immediately think of violent diarrhea?
Dude, brown and bubbly?! Who on the english-speaking earth doesn't immediately think of violent diarrhea?
36points
#13
Axe body spray.
Wow, what a cool brand, anybody can get laid if they just use axe body spray. One day axe did a survey after sales had dropped because all of their ads feature a nerdy loser using it leading to it gaining a reputation of "only losers use axe body spray".
Wow, what a cool brand, anybody can get laid if they just use axe body spray. One day axe did a survey after sales had dropped because all of their ads feature a nerdy loser using it leading to it gaining a reputation of "only losers use axe body spray".
35points
#14
Pepsi thinking Kendall Jenner handing a cop a Pepsi could solve racism. Someone in a boardroom approved that. Multiple people watched it and said "yes, this is good." That's the part that gets me.
34points
#15
Dasani tried selling in the UK, knowing they’d need to overcome some hurdles, particularly that bottled water just really wasn’t a thing over there like in the US. In the UK, spring-sourced mineral water would come in bottles and be more expensive because of the source, but just normal bottled water wasn’t out there.
Unfortunately for Dasani, they bottled the water from an area nearby Peckham, where an episode of Only Fools and Horses featured the main comedy duo secretly selling tap water marketed as mineral water with the episode ending revealing that they’d accidentally contaminated the water source.
3 weeks after Dasani launched, a journalist noticed in a grocery supply magazine that Dasani was treated tap water with minerals added rather than spring-sourced mineral water but priced the same.
That hurt the brand, but the death blow came when it turned out that a bad batch of calcium chloride had been delivered to them which resulted in elevated levels of bromate in the final product forcing a massive recall.
So Dasani was selling tap water “marketed” as mineral water that it turns out was contaminated. It was the plot of the episode almost to a T.
Dasani ceased UK operations shortly after the recall.
Coca-Cola did later release other brands, but they’re all specifically spring or mineral water now.
Unfortunately for Dasani, they bottled the water from an area nearby Peckham, where an episode of Only Fools and Horses featured the main comedy duo secretly selling tap water marketed as mineral water with the episode ending revealing that they’d accidentally contaminated the water source.
3 weeks after Dasani launched, a journalist noticed in a grocery supply magazine that Dasani was treated tap water with minerals added rather than spring-sourced mineral water but priced the same.
That hurt the brand, but the death blow came when it turned out that a bad batch of calcium chloride had been delivered to them which resulted in elevated levels of bromate in the final product forcing a massive recall.
So Dasani was selling tap water “marketed” as mineral water that it turns out was contaminated. It was the plot of the episode almost to a T.
Dasani ceased UK operations shortly after the recall.
Coca-Cola did later release other brands, but they’re all specifically spring or mineral water now.
34points
#16
If you’re on TikTok look up Pavvy the Goaltender.
She used to love Bauer equipment and would showcase her thousands of dollars of purchases. Someone sent her a catalogue of soon-to-be-released equipment and she showed it to her niche following and showcased the things she was excited about.
Bauer reached out the her asking for her personal contact information to discuss a collab. She was excited. As soon as they had her personal email they sent her a cease and desist letter. The catalogue had not yet been released and they don’t want it shown. They could have just asked her to take the video down.
And so the internet did its thing. .
She used to love Bauer equipment and would showcase her thousands of dollars of purchases. Someone sent her a catalogue of soon-to-be-released equipment and she showed it to her niche following and showcased the things she was excited about.
Bauer reached out the her asking for her personal contact information to discuss a collab. She was excited. As soon as they had her personal email they sent her a cease and desist letter. The catalogue had not yet been released and they don’t want it shown. They could have just asked her to take the video down.
And so the internet did its thing. .
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32points
#17
The Ring doorbell Super Bowl ad. My whole family was shocked to realize what a surveillance system we built voluntarily to report our every movement to whomever can pay for the data.
tonitalksaboutit:
That one and the AI one were both shocking to me that they got ok'ed.
"Let AI do the work, so you have more time to do life" more like "hey ai can do your job, so we won't be needing you anymore".
tonitalksaboutit:
That one and the AI one were both shocking to me that they got ok'ed.
"Let AI do the work, so you have more time to do life" more like "hey ai can do your job, so we won't be needing you anymore".
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31points
#18
Andrew Windsor deciding to, unprompted, an absolute car crash interview about early epstein allegations. Saying he couldn't sweat and was at pizza express at the time etc. You could practically hear the muffled screams of his PR manager from whatever cupboard they had been stuffed into.
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31points
#19
The Pittsburgh Pirates had personalized bricks outside their stadium that people purchased when the stadium opened in 2001. They were touted as being there forever. Before last season they just vanished and no one knew where they went (aside from ownership). Until someone took a photo of them in pile in a dump.
HappyKhicken:
Worse than that, the fans actively tried to at least get them back so they could be returned to the original owners, but were blocked by the Pirates at every turn.
It was a big deal in the Pittsburgh area and people were super pissed off. One of the rare times I've seen everyone agree on the same side on social media.
shiftingtech:
Its amazing how many organizations fundraise with "forever" things, without actually thinking it through.
Tourist attraction / historical park near me used to sell really nice wooden benches with name plates on them. Great benches. But...the contract says the bench is permanent... Care to guess how many times the site carpenters have to repair the bench before it costs more than the fundraiser ever made?
HappyKhicken:
Worse than that, the fans actively tried to at least get them back so they could be returned to the original owners, but were blocked by the Pirates at every turn.
It was a big deal in the Pittsburgh area and people were super pissed off. One of the rare times I've seen everyone agree on the same side on social media.
shiftingtech:
Its amazing how many organizations fundraise with "forever" things, without actually thinking it through.
Tourist attraction / historical park near me used to sell really nice wooden benches with name plates on them. Great benches. But...the contract says the bench is permanent... Care to guess how many times the site carpenters have to repair the bench before it costs more than the fundraiser ever made?
28points
#20
The LifeLock CEO putting his social security number on a billboard.
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27points