Case Study 1: United Breaks Guitars

“United Breaks Guitars” is the name of a song that was written and posted on the internet by Dave Carroll after he took a flight from Chicago to Nebraska on United Airlines. He looked out the window and saw those loading the plane being very irresponsible with a bunch of guitars. He was traveling with his band, and they were very concerned. They tried to tell three different employees and were met with indifference.
When he arrived in Nebraska he found that there was $1,200 worth of damage done to his guitar. He spent the next couple of months making telephone calls and trying to find out how to get this paid for or replaced. Everyone he spoke to transferred him to someone else.
When someone finally told him that they would not be able to replace his guitar or even give him flying vouchers. He informed them that he would write three songs and post them on the internet. His first song got thousands of hits.
United quickly contacted him after the release of his first song and wanted to work with him to try to correct what had gone wrong.
I think this is a really interesting showing of how creative publicity can really draw people’s attention. People who are dissatisfied don’t usually act out publicly about their dissatisfaction. If they do, it draws a lot of attention.
Companies always want to be sure they are on their toes in dealing with customer satisfaction. This will prevent the few dissatisfied customers who might act out publicly from doing so.
This also shows that publicity can reach a lot of people. The internet is the newest way for people to be able to express their opinions to millions of people easily and quickly. Dissatisfied customers, as well as satisfied customers are able to tell many others about their experience with a company quickly.
People will trust things more if they are not from the company itself. They will be more apt to believe that it just isn’t just the company line if it is coming from an outside source. This is why public relations is so important. If you can find a way to generate publicity from the consumers, people will be more apt to believe it, and it will be better for your company’s image.