United Breaks Guitars

Dave Carroll’s reaction to United Airline’s complete disregard of doing the right thing was a . fiasco the airline company could have avoided entirely. Since this is my blog I will disregard conciseness at times, but I will stick to AP style in all other aspects. After all, I own this blog and if I want to add an extra word here and there, I’m going to do it. Okay, enough babbling. A simple $1,200 fix turned into a reported $180 million dollar loss for United within four days of the video’s release. According to the report by Chris Ayres of the Times Online, that number “would have bought Carroll more than 51,000 replacement guitars.” Carroll gave them nine months to fix their mistake and he did warn them about what he would do, but the big bad airline wasn’t going to be bullied by some small time folk singer from Canada. I guess the joke was on them.
Like I said Carroll told the airline he would write three songs and music videos about the airline breaking his guitar and how the situation was handled. What was a lapse in judgment by United turned out to be a brilliant move for Carroll. His catchy tunes and slap stick music video quickly attracted attention to the tune of 461 comments and more than 24,000 views on Youtube within 23 hours of its release. As of the moment I am writing this, the original video has posted by Carroll and his band Sons of Maxwell has been viewed an astounding 9,144,470 times! In a brilliant move, Carroll has turned his misfortune into immediate national exposure. Although his music career hasn’t exactly soared to mega-stardom, he has turned his fame into a nice public speaking gig. Carroll gets numerous invites and even has an invite to speak at the one and only, Utah State University. Whether he shows up depends on an unnamed to PR professor. I applaud Mr. Carroll for his persistence and creativeness. Score one for the little guy.
Like I said earlier, United could have avoided this whole thing if they would have used just a tiny bit of common sense. I know big corporations like United have policies that protect them from situations like this, but after nine months of pestering, you would think united would realize Carroll wasn’t going to stop until justice was served. After Carroll posted the first of his United trilogy on Youtube, United then offered Carroll the $1,200 to fix his guitar. They lauded him for his video and seemed to try and laugh the whole thing off. Why not try and spin the whole ordeal in a positive light and hire Carroll to do some commercials for them or host some of his concerts. After the first nine months of non-action by United, I am not surprised the light bulb never went on. Seems to me, United needs to change a few of those light bulbs, if you know what I mean. Carroll’s songs attracted millions of views you would think United would take notice and use his talents for them. United’s lack of judgment baffles me every time I think of this gaffe and I am surely not going to be flying the friendly skies on a United plane. After all, if United breaks guitars, what else do they break?