When a public tragedy temporarily colors a company's name, marketing experts recommend candid communication to avoid a permanent stain.

"It is important for those who are involved to be open and transparent and communicating in an ongoing manner with stakeholders," said Chris Talley, a spokesman in Austin for worldwide advertising/governmental relations firm Fleishman Hillard. He defined stakeholders as affected family members, community residents, employers, elected officials and their constituents.

The suicide of Hands on a Hardbody contestant Richard "Ricky" Vega on Thursday cast a shadow on two businesses — event sponsor Nissan Patterson and Kmart, where Vega broke in and took the shotgun with which he killed himself.

Neither Kmart nor Patterson Nissan would answer reporters' questions Friday. Both issued formal statements decrying the tragedy and expressing sympathy for Vega's family. The dealership's statement added that the future of the well-known event has not been decided.

Longview Mayor Jay Dean said his thoughts go first to Vega's family, but he also expressed concern for the larger Longview family he leads.

"We're a strong, family-based community, and anytime a situation like this happens in our community it touches us all," Dean said. "We'll work our way through this event and look toward the future."

Talley said businesses that emerge from tragedies in good shape are very proactive in their response.

"In a tight-knit community, where people know each other, it is important to be visible and be open," Talley said. "The wrong thing to do would be to do the opposite. ... In a crisis situation, and this definitely is, it's important to establish all the facts as quickly as possible."

Talley said the modern-day example of the right way to respond is Tylenol. The pain pill's maker, Johnson & Johnson, aggressively leapt into the national debate that followed the 1982 deaths of seven people who took Extra-Strength Tylenol that had been laced with cyanide on the grocery shelf.

The company issued a nationwide recall and pioneered the tamper-proof containers that now are commonplace.

Company officials for Luby's flew to Killeen on Oct. 16, 1991, the day a man drove into the cafeteria and fatally shot 24 people. The company's chief executive officer, three senior vice presidents and other executives made themselves available for media interviews. The company also created a $100,000 victims assistance fund and rented 40 motel rooms for victims' family members.

Marketing officials at Luby's Houston headquarters did not respond to a request for comment.

Twenty-two years after the crime, local people still refer to the KFC murders, the 1983 kidnapping and murder of five people taken from a Kilgore fast food restaurant. A spokeswoman for KFC, which owned the now-closed Kentucky Fried Chicken in Kilgore, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.