United Airlines Breaks Guitars

I just couldn’t resist this one. The most entertaining example I’ve seen of the joys of social media when it comes to providing an outlet for the rage imparted by trying to deal with obdurate customer services – and an object lesson for brands about the powers of social media when it comes to reputation damage.

For those who haven’t yet seen it (and there may still be some), Dave Carroll is a man with a musical mission: to tell his story of what happened when United Airlines wilfully damaged his guitar in transit and then refused to own up, or cough up for the damage. His story is blogged here, and ends:

United has demonstrated they know how to keep their airline in the forefront of their customer’s minds and I wanted this project to expand upon that satirically. I’ve been done “being angry” for quite some time and, if anything, I should thank United. They’ve given me a creative outlet that has brought people together from around the world. We had a pile of laughs making the recording and the video while the images are spinning on how to make “United: Song 2” even better than the first. So, thanks United! If my guitar had to be smashed due to extreme negligence I’m glad it was you that did it. Now sit back and enjoy the show.

And here it is. Enjoy. (Or watch it - un-cropped by my blog formatting - on YouTube here)



Perhaps we could think of this as a little exercise about damage limitation in Web 2.0. If it was your brand (or your client’s) on the line, what would you do in response? United Airlines say they are going to be using this video internally to ensure better customer service: all well and good. They might also use it as a ‘how not to’ for their baggage handling staff. But on a quick search of the web and Twitter, I haven’t yet come across any communication from United to their customers. Why not?