United's PR struggles

Dave Carroll and United Airlines
Tyler Newbold

Dave Carroll became famous with his ‘United Breaks guitars’ youtube video. Carroll, a musician from Canada had his guitar broken by United Airlines workers and United has felt the pain from it. Carroll who posted a youtube video about how his $3500 Taylor Guitar was broken and has cost the company an estimated $180 million.
Dave Carroll did the right thing by trying to get compensation for his broken guitar. They had been careless with a very expensive guitar the situation needs to be addressed. Dave tried numerous times with different parts of United company to receive compensation with no success. Finally, a United worker named Ms. Irlweg told Carroll that they would not be responsible for the matter and that it would be the last email on the subject. Carroll calmly told the woman that he was going to put three videos on youtube about his experience with United. Carroll could not of imagined how well his videos would do. They have spread like wildfire on youtube and all throughout the social media websites. With so many people talking about the issue it has hurt the image of United and has cost them dearly. Carroll clearly did the correct thing by trying to get compensation for his broken guitar. Not getting anything from them has turned out to be a blessing in disguise as Carroll’s videos have boosted his popularity and has provided him with more money than he ever wanted from United.
It would have been a lot better for United to pay Carroll for his damaged guitar and been done with it. With so much information out there and social media everywhere, PR workers must be smart and understand that nothing will get unnoticed. If a company does something wrong it needs to take care of it quickly or else it could turn out as bad for them as it did for United. This example also shows us how fast information on social media can travel. It is hard to predict but when something goes BIG on a social media site then it really goes BIG.
United clearly did the wrong thing by not helping Dave Carroll and thinking that his story would just pass by and not affect them much. They paid the price for that mistake and many companies can learn from United by keeping customer service at the top of their priority list. Once United realized they were losing lots of money they offered to pay Carroll. Carroll declined the money and asked them to give it to a charity. United donated $3000 to the Thelonius Monk Institute of Jazz for music education for kids which is something United had to do. The damage had already been done and United is desperately trying to improve its image.
With so many social media outlets it is important for companies to understand how to react to customers and treat them in a way that the social media can benefit them. Social media can be a benefit to companies that use them properly and communicate to their publics through them. Its important to understand that everyone has a say through social media and that mistreating one person can turn into a PR nightmare if not handled in the proper way. Companies need to embrace the social media and figure out how they can best use them to their advantage.