Whole Foods v. FTC: Round II
When I last wrote about Whole Foods’ CEO John Mackey’s tussle with the FTC, I concluded the post with “This will be interesting to watch.”
Indeed.
A number of financial blogs are posting on a footnote of an FTC document released on Tuesday, that alleges the CEO posted to message boards using the pseudonym “Rahodeb” (while not exactly an anagram, it is a variation of his wife’s name, Deborah). For seven years, “Rahodeb” posted messages on the Yahoo! Finance message board, extolling the values of Whole Foods’ stock, and occasionally taking a jab at competitor Wild Oats Market’s operations. This was at best a bad idea, and could potentially be considered an attempt to manipulate the stock prices of either Whole Foods or Wild Oats, or both.
Yikes. While I wasn’t sure how Mackey’s earlier use of his blog would play out in the court of public opinion, these revelations will undoubtedly hurt the CEO’s reputation.
It’s great to have a company blog when faced with a crisis, but it’s far less effective when the crises being responded to are being created by the CEO.
