Some companies this year did not have much success as they did not live up to code due to various reasons
Foodpanda
Foodpanda proved beneficial during the pandemic by delivering food items to customers at every locale. But the brand found itself in hot waters due to an incident. When an anti-government protest took place in Thailand in July, a Foodpanda delivery boy had set fire to a poster of Thailand’s King Maha Vajiralongkorn. The company immediately fired the man right after.
The brand also faced controversy after the company’s Bollywood themed advertisement featured an all Malay cast. The ad had triggered a conversation among people about Malaysia and the cultural appropriation and erasure of Malaysian-Indians from the popular culture.
Vitasoy
Vitasoy, a Hong Kong brand, was caught in the fire of political tension between Hong Kong and China. A politically-charged crime had been committed by a Hong Kong employee against a police officer. The company initially decided to show sympathy to its employee but soon faced trouble from social media. The brand then went to express support to the police, but by then Chinese influencers and brand ambassadors cut ties with them.
Vitasoy was later asked to share employee data after getting their signature on the matter. The data would include personal information about them and their family members, work history and association with other groups. If at any time law agencies require this information, the company should disclose it.
The Chinese e-commerce platform faced issues when it failed to handle employee ethics and the recent death of a staff member. The staff member had committed suicide due to an overburden of work which brought out social media complaining about the company’s normalization on extended working hours.
Another employee had also committed suicide just 6 months later. The brand reported that the employee had asked for leave but was denied as he did not provide a reason for it. The company stated that they have set up counselling services for its employees. Regardless, the brand showed an unremorseful attitude towards the employees.
Clubhouse
The clubhouse app has been more of a rise and fall during the pandemic ever since the CEO of Tesla, Elon Musk along with other influential people hosted a conversation on the app.
The brand had hype during its initial months but slowly died down without challenging any existing social media application. Much of this is due to the late updates, the invite-only rule and privacy concerns.
A news article highlighted for weeks was sparked by the whistleblower Frances Haugen, a former employee of Facebook who went against the company for its role in hurting the self-esteem of children and indirect aid for human trafficking.
The company decided to rebrand itself to a completely new name which was unsurprisingly mocked by some people and other brands.
Rohingya refugees sued the company earlier for allowing hate speech against them to spread on the app.
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