Dive Brief:
- Johnson’s Sausage Shoppe Inc. issued a recall on an undetermined amount of beef jerky sold under North Oak, Twisted Oak Farms and Johnson’s Sausage Shoppe brands after inspectors discovered evidence it had been shipped without proper inspection, according to Food Safety News.
- The Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection said that there have been no confirmed illnesses in connection with the jerky.
- The recalled jerky products contain the Wisconsin legend with the number 293 on the label or packaging.
Dive Insight:
In September, the Food Safety Modernization Act rules, which are supposed to provide stricter controls for all human and pet food, went into effect for large manufacturers with more than 500 employees. A large part of FSMA concerns itself with safety measures and a more standardized approach to scenarios like recalls, inspections and production shutdowns.
However, as the incident with the beef jerky clearly shows, the system is not perfect.
A joint study by the Food Marketing Institute and Grocery Manufacturers Association estimated the average cost of a recall for food companies to be $10 million in direct costs, plus brand damage and lost sales. That’s a steep amount, and one that most companies obviously would rather not have to deal with.
But when recalls do happen, analysts say it’s important to get in front of them and not hide from the media. Taking blame and alerting customers of the efforts to fix the problem can do a lot to repair trust. It’s likely that the product will lose some customers for a while — most do after a recall — but minimizing the fallout is important.
A Harris Interactive poll found that 55% of consumers would switch brands temporarily following a recall, and only 15% would never buy the recalled product.