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Taylor Farms' founder finally spoke. About how Americans aren't eating enough salad.
On Friday, founder and CEO of Taylor Farms Bruce Taylor gave his first comments since the outbreak began, and he used them to change the subject. The more interesting story, he told Forbes, is that produce sales are down 10 percent nationally and leafy greens are down 40 percent — his numbers, which nobody else has confirmed. He adds that Americans are scared and avoiding healthy fresh food to their own detriment.
The CDC has confirmed 4,173 cases of this parasite since May 1, is working through more than 7,400 additional reports, and has logged at least 308 hospitalizations. Cyclospora means a week or more of severe diarrhea, cramps and exhaustion.
So the man whose shredded lettuce is at the center of it is worried that the country isn't eating enough vegetables.
And he gave those comments by email. That matters even more maybe than the fact that it went out on a Friday. Email means nothing is improvised, and no reporter gets to say "hold on, what about the post where you said the FDA apologized to you?" which, in the exchange Forbes ran, never comes up. A written statement in week one is (maybe) fine. A written statement as the first and only time your founder speaks, four weeks in, tells every reporter and comms person reading it that he can't survive a follow-up question.
The useful exercise is writing the statement he should have given instead, out loud and under his own name, because almost all of (should) clear a legal bar:
The CDC has confirmed more than 4,000 cyclospora cases since May 1 and is reviewing thousands more, with over 300 people hospitalized. The FDA's investigation has pointed at shredded iceberg lettuce from our operations in central Mexico. We pulled that product and it stays out for the rest of the season.
I want to be straight about what I don't know. We haven't found the source of the contamination. Our own people are in the fields and the plants looking for it alongside the FDA, and when we find it I'll tell you what we found even if it's bad for us.
I also owe an apology for something that's entirely mine. Our recall notice was hard to read and people couldn't tell what was safe to eat. And we put out a statement about the FDA that we never should have written because a lab correction isn't a victory and I'm sorry we treated it like one. The confusion that came from our words is on me, not on the people trying to keep anyone safe.
If you have the recalled lettuce, throw it out. If you got sick, we want to hear from you.
Look at what that would have cost him. He never says his lettuce made anyone ill, that's the causation admission the plaintiffs' lawyers want, and he can't give it. He quotes the CDC's number, which belongs to the CDC and is already in every complaint being drafted. He apologizes only for his own words, which are documented and indefensible. He concedes he hasn't found the source, which the FDA's own lack of a positive product test was going to force him to concede anyway. And the industry-damage argument is gone entirely because that message belongs to a trade group or a customer.
So three considerations if you ever find yourself in a similar position, and they're all about venue and voice:
Speak for yourself, in person. If your CEO's only public appearance in a four-week crisis is a set of emailed answers, you've told everyone he/she can't handle a follow-up.
Put the industry argument where the industry lives. Bruce Taylor wasn't wrong to think produce demand is taking a hit but he was wrong about the room. That case belongs in The Packer, at a produce conference, in a trade association's hands, in front of an audience that already knows the science and has skin in the same game. Said to a business outlet while people are still in the hospital, it's deflection no matter how good the math is. Same argument, two venues, two completely different meanings and choosing the venue is your job, not his.
Own something before you defend anything. I'm not talking about the causation, because you can't give that and shouldn't. But own the piece that's yours: the recall notice nobody could read, the statement you shouldn't have posted, the thing you got wrong about your own communications. Say that first and you buy the right to say everything else. But skip it and every true thing you say afterward gets read as an attempt to get out from under it.
Earnings Preview: what is all this AI money buying?
Last week Google reported a good quarter with sales up, business healthy and its stock still dropped 7 percent. The reason was that Google said it plans to spend even more on AI than it had already promised so investors looked past the good news and reacted to the spending. That's a story problem, not a numbers problem, which puts it squarely in the CCO Dispatch lane.
Wednesday and Thursday, four more report: Meta, Microsoft, Amazon and Apple. Each is in a different spot. Meta's stock is down about 10 percent this year and well off its peak, and it just told investors the AI bill is going up again. Microsoft is down roughly 23 percent, the worst of the bunch, for a different reason because people worry AI will eat the software business Microsoft already sells. Amazon has committed to something like $200 billion this year and everyone's waiting to see if that grows. And Apple, which has spent comparatively little on AI, is up.
That last one is useful for us because investors aren't paying for an AI story. They're paying for a story that matches what a company is spending and Apple is doing fine without one. So if someone is pushing you to produce an AI message your company hasn't actually funded, this week gives you something to point at. Whatever words these four use to defend their spending are the words your board and your CFO will borrow when they come asking. Easier to watch them get invented than to invent them yourself in a hurry.