Cover sheet for submission of

work for assessment

SCHOOL: RMIT University

Office use only

Program name Foundation of Public Relation Program code COMM2374

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TAFE National Module Unit TAFE National Module

of Competency (UOC) Unit of Competency (UOC)
name ID School date stamp

Assignment 29/2/2019 Edward Wade

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no.
Hanoi
Campus Class day/time Tutor/marker’s name

STUDENT/S
Family name Given name Student number
Minh Tri S3678621
(1) Le

(2)

(3)

(4)

(5)

(6)

DECLARATION AND STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

1. I/we hold a copy of this work which can be produced if the original is lost/damaged.
2. This work is my/our original work and no part of it has been copied from any other student’s work or from any other source except where due
acknowledgement is made.
3. No part of this work has been written for me/us by any other person except where such collaboration has been authorised by the lecturer/teacher
concerned.
4. I/we have not previously submitted this work for this or any other course/unit.
5. I/we give permission for this work to be reproduced, communicated, compared and archived for the purpose of detecting plagiarism.
6. I/we give permission for a copy of my/our marked work to be retained by the school for review and comparison, including review by external
examiners.
I/we understand that:
7. Plagiarism is the presentation of the work, idea or creation of another person as though it is my/our own. It is a form of cheating and is a very serious
academic offence that may lead to exclusion from the University. Plagiarised material can be drawn from, and presented in, written, graphic and
visual form, including electronic data and oral presentations. Plagiarism occurs when the origin of the material used is not appropriately cited.
8. Plagiarism includes the act of assisting or allowing another person to plagiarise or to copy my/our work.

Student signature/s
I/we declare that I/we have read and understood the declaration and statement of authorship.

(1) Tri (2)

 (3) (4)

(5) (6)

Further information relating to the penalties for plagiarism, which range from a notation on your student file to expulsion from the University, is contained
in Regulation 6.1.1 Student Discipline and the Plagiarism Policy which are available on the Policies and Procedures website at
www.rmit.edu.au/policies.
Copies of this form can be downloaded from the student forms web page at www.rmit.edu.au/students/forms.

Cover sheet for submission of work for assessment 1111 page 1 of 1

Le Minh Tri
S3678621

RESPONSIBILITY ACCEPTANCE IN COMMUNICATION

Understanding the effect of accepting responsibilities is one of the key factors that create and
maintain positive impact in the business world. More than often we hear of a business’s
“scandalous event” and we are quick to pick the side of negative judgments without paying
attention to what has to offer. By simply grasping this idea as well as making appropriate
statements at the right place and time, in 2018 KFC was able to reverse their seemingly
disastrous situation into positive direction. KFC’s “FCK” campaign became a portrait a classic
example of Public Relation’s real value in issue management in my opinion.

I.Where it all began

KFC is not an unfamiliar name to us since the brand was introduced to the world since 1952.
The image of old Colonel Sanders on red & white-striped background is a timeless statuary of
fast food innovation and Kentucky’s pride of honor. First opened in South Salt Lake, Utah,
Kentucky Fried Chicken made its name through Sander’s idea of personalizing his advertising
approach by promoting self-image, at the same time making his progress toward making a
chicken recipe that is delicious for everyone’s taste. He drove around the country, invited each
restaurant owner he met to try his food and attempted to cooperate with them personally to set
up deals that benefit their business in exchange for sharing KFC’s secret recipe.

1. Expansion
Sanders expanded his franchise image by remaining a spokesman after successfully having
over 600 restaurants in United States and Canada that actively sold his products. He sold his
KFC’s company stake to John Y. Brown Jr.’s investment group by settling deals that allowed his
reputation to be enhanced in their products. Packaged food and drink company Heublein Inc
bought the franchise for 285 million dollars on July 8, 1971. Since the 1980s, KFC franchise
had grown and been recognized in 3500 company-owned restaurants around the world. Due to
market pressure from McDonald’s, Heublein Inc transferred KFC ownership to R.J Reynolds, a
tobacco firm. In spite of deciding to provide 168 million dollar investment for the purpose of
expanding KFC, R.J Reynolds later handled the business to PepsiCo.
2. Through time
Kentucky Fried Chicken had grown to become a prominent brand not only in direct marketing
but also productivity. One of the most successful KFC products that are made in the United
States under PepsiCo was the “Snacker”, a low-price small chicken burger. Launched in March
2005, Snackers were considered to have a large impact on fast-food market at the time with
sales over 100 million. 2010 marks the birth of the Double Down sandwich, which was added by
two chicken pieces. From March 2011 to March 2013, it made 15 million in sales. In addition to
the company’s selling effectivity, Colonel Sanders’s image and repetition of tendency in using
branding prominence have been inseparable factors in KFC’s overall success. In recent years,
it is not hard to recognize all their restaurants put on view variables of Colonel Sander’s
designed themes as well as his images in every aspects of promotion. Nowadays there are
approximately 18000 KFC outlets in total 120 countries around the world, which leads to a
global media exposure on the product on a mass scale.

II. KFC in UK
The first KFC international brand in United Kingdom was opened in Preston city and was also
known to be the first American fast-food restaurant chain that was introduced in 1965. In
November 1968, new KFC branch was opened in London and by 1975 it was recorded that
there were 250 outlets in the country. First drive-through system was implemented in 1984.
Since 2006, KFC decided to remove trans-fat from their food and stop adding salt to the pre-
processed french-fries. Lavazza coffee was first served in all outlets and by the time there were
784 active outlets in England territory. 110 restaurants that have Halal-certified approve was
recorded by the end of February 2019.
 The first Preston branch opened in May 1965.
(Reproduced from Lancashire Post website)

In the UK, Australia and New Zealand, sandwiches are referred to as “burgers”; there is the
chicken fillet burger (a chicken breast fillet coated in an original-recipe coating with salad
garnish and mayonnaise) and a Zinger Burger (as with the former but with a spicier coating and
salsa). Both of these are available as “tower” variants, which include a slice of cheese and a
hash brown.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KFC#Europe

III. What happened?

In February 2018, multiple media outlets including numbers of international news and blogs
such as The Huff Post and The Guardians informed a business fiasco that started with
Kentucky Fried Chicken 2 days earlier. KFC restaurants had been on the shortage of chicken
meat and other ingredients and during the 10 days following the incident, hundreds of
restaurants in the United Kingdom were closed. The customers were outrageous, thousands of
negative responses were recorded on traditional media as well as social network sites including
Twitters, Facebook and Instagram. KFC were facing one of the most prominent disasters since
the beginning of constructing their business in 1965: a potential collapse of FKC franchise
operation in UK.
The situation was very difficult for the company. 750 out of total 900 outlets were closed and a
temporary cut in KFC staff members across the country. Meghan Farren, the chief officer who
is responsible for marketing in UK and Ireland stated that 26000 KFC team members across the
region received abusive speech from customers on a daily basis and claimed that the public did
not understand their laziness was not the problem and the overall issue was not informed
appropriately. According to Good Morning Britain broadcast on 20 February 2018, a total of 14
million fresh pieces of chicken meat were kept at DHL warehouses as DHL operation did not
meet KFC requirement to provide a stable supply chain in order to deliver enough chickens.

General stats of KFC 2018’s chicken crisis

(reproduced from Campaignlive website)

(Reproduced from Campaignlive website)

IV.
1. A student’s thoughts
When I was in the 4th day after the first assignment deadline, struggling to find an abstract
formula and planning a “perfect mechanism” to advance time management skills and eliminate
procrastination, I realized that I have only attempted to improve a half truth. Life is not just all
about making smart plans and being ignorant to reach “successfulness”, it is also a web of
connections and beliefs between humans and our 3d universe.
For me at the moment, changes and new perspectives are only considered to be “real” if we
tend to execute those ideas in real life. By trusting others and stop dwelling myself into many
“worst-case scenarios”, I can start exploring, connecting and working freely under pressure.
What I have learned is taking time to aim for perfection in an imperfect world is a choice, and
accepting responsibilities plays a crucial part in the overall picture. That’s exactly what KFC did
a year ago in my opinion.

2. Where were all the chickens?

To answer the inverted pyramid questions, I usually take a look at where it all started. In
October 2017 KFC closed its kinship with its long term-partner Bidvest Logistics, which is a
logistic company specializing in food delivery. KFC turned its attention to settle a new contract
with Quick Service Logistics and Deutsche Post, which was owned by DHL. KFC long-term plan
was to upgrade their supply chain with the new contractors in order to provide home-delivery
services to English customers. Both KFC and DHL targeted a goal of revolutionizing food-
service in United Kingdom and concentrated on “innovation, quality and reliability”.

However just weeks after execution, there was a problem within the supply chain operation in
Rugby. Franchisees across the UK did not receive necessary quantity of chicken meats in time
due to a lack of operators and faculties from operation center in Rugby. Chickens had been
stuck in warehouses since February 2018 due to varieties of reasons: not enough drivers,
trucks and a crash on m6 route in Preston.

3. Working on it
The chicken delivery problem was extremely intense to the point where the company was
unable to announce when the operations will be back to its formal state. It is seen that KFC
tried its best to resolve a problem when it started to show that all hopes were loosen.
English customers had noticed the signs that were attached on KFC’s outlets: “Sorry, we’re
closed. We deliver our chickens fresh into our restaurants, but we’ve had a few hiccups with
the delivery today. We wouldn’t want to be open without offering our full menu, but we’ll be
back at the fryers as soon as we can.” It got out of hand when KFC began to toss the blame
to its supply-chain contractor DHL on a tweet. The situation was dire.
 4. Mother’s salvation
Mother is an advertising agency that was based in London, UK

V. “KFC: A very fcking clever campaign”

In this campaign we look at the concept of

1. An unpublished research plan

2. KFC’s objectives
3. Execution
4. Results
5. Responsibility acceptance
6. A two-way asymmetrical model or two-way symmetrical model?
7. Media relation
8. Effectiveness

Final thoughts
REF
Links: https://www.fastfoodmenuprices.com/an-overview-of-the-history-of-kfc/
https://www.ukessays.com/essays/marketing/business-history-and-overview-of-kentucky-fried-chicken-
marketing-essay.php
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KFC#Europe
https://www.adsoftheworld.com/media/print/kfc_fck
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/feb/19/kfc-uk-closed-chicken-shortage-fash-food-contract-
delivery-dhl

Pics:
https://medium.com/@dennisnafte/colonel-sanders-failed-1009-times-before-succeeding-ac5492a5c191
https://www.lep.co.uk/retro/britain-s-first-kentucky-fried-chicken-flies-the-coop-after-49-years-1-6987614
https://www.adsoftheworld.com/media/print/kfc_fck
https://twitter.com/KFC_UKI/status/964838797841190912/photo/1

Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4VtITHr-OQ