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We've all heard the phrase "truth is stranger than fiction," and that certainly rings true when it comes to risk management. The fact of the matter is, you simply can't plan for the unexpected. No matter how much preparation and risk management training you offer your teams, the stranger things that impact your enterprise are ones that you can't control or predict. In this article we'll discuss some of the weird risk events that we've seen and what companies can do to lessen their impact.

Late last year, a price cut on Nutella caused quite the commotion in French supermarkets that some described as resembling the worst of Black Friday shopping in the United States. When news spread that Nutella lovers could get their hands on a €4.50 tub of the chocolate hazelnut spread for €1.40—a 70% discount—supermarkets soon realized they bit off more than they could chew, with hundreds of customers flocking to the stores. In videos that went viral on social media, large crowds of customers can be seen pushing, shoving, running and even bleeding in their attempt to snag a tub of discounted Nutella—all grounds for a potential hefty lawsuit if a customer was seriously injured. Supermarket employees were clearly not prepared to handle the aftermath of what executives thought would simply be a big sale, including the extra foot traffic in their stores and especially the extra security needed to keep customers and employees safe during the sale.

Another chocolate-related example: last year, tons of chocolate milk spilled across all six lanes on a highway in Poland when the truck that was transporting the milk rolled over. Soon enough, the river of chocolate milk began to harden, blocking traffic for miles in both directions—not to mention the mess for clean-up crews. One local firefighter said clearing the hardening chocolate was worse than snow. Eventually, crews used hot water to melt the chocolate off the road, but even this took hours. Aside from the traffic disruption and cleanup, the spill also made a mess for the chocolate milk company's supply chain. With a breakdown in their logistics and tons of their product going to waste, the company had to find an alternative form of transporting the product and took a hit for the loss of their milk. The spill also could have had major legal implications if innocent bystanders were injured as a result of the accident.

Ice cream can also be the culprit of supply chain disruptions, like in the case of German discounter Aldi Nord, which was forced to recall one of its ice cream products due to wood chips being found in the frozen treat. This would be puzzling for many suppliers, but the key to Aldi Nord being able to mitigate this crisis was its ability to trace back the source of the wood chips, before anyone actually ingested the foreign objects. It was later discovered that a defect in a production plant was responsible for the fact that wood chips had gotten in the ice cream, impacting the profits of that product line and the brand reputation of the organization as a whole.

Brand reputation issues can also be the result of instances seemingly out of a company's control. In the case of Blue Bell ice cream, the company came under fire when a video went viral of a woman licking a tub of the ice cream and putting it back in the supermarket freezer—inspiring the "#IceCreamChallenge." Soon, more videos of copycat ice cream lickers began popping up on the internet—turning what a few kids thought was a harmless prank into a big and unexpected reputation issue for Blue Bell. While there wasn't much the company could do to prevent this crisis from occurring, what Blue Bell and any organization facing a brand reputation issue should focus on is their response to the crisis. The way in which a company responds to a crisis can either bolster its reputation or cause it to slip even further. In this case, aside from seeking legal action against the ice cream lickers, Blue Bell chose to respond by looking to ways within their manufacturing process to add additional protection in the ice cream carton.

Risk is inevitable in today's business landscape—even the strange ones. While many threats can't be avoided altogether, organizations can ensure they are able to successfully mitigate threats on the spot by having a complete risk management strategy in place. This means leveraging digitization efforts like AI-enabled technology to help identify threats and assess their potential impact the moment they occur. Organizations also must have risk mitigation plans in place before disaster strikes and be familiar with the plans so organizations and their suppliers can collaboratively enact their plans and respond to a threat.

Whether you can't make deliveries because the highway turned into a chocolate river, face brand reputation issues stemming from the rise of ice cream lickers, or damaged goods in the great Nutella riot of 2018, business leaders need to be agile so they are able to respond to even the strangest scenarios to not only ensure the viability of an organization but avoid potential lawsuits. That ability to quickly respond to a threat on the bottom line is essential to ensuring the resilience of an organization's supply chain and the success of the business as a whole.

Erin Denlea is the marketing director for NA at riskmethods, working to empower companies of any size to master supply risk and create reliable supply networks.