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THE CONSUMERIST
Tim Moore
Issue date: 3/11/08 Section: Features
"Shoppers bite back" is the tagline for the consumer affairs blog, Consumerist.com. One look at the content validates the tagline. In a brutal world of poor customer service, The Consumerist's main objective is outing businesses for their shady and unethical practices.
The Consumerist is owned by blogging stronghold, Gawker Media, and is run by editor Ben Popken, senior editor Meghann Marco, associate editor Chris Walters, and weekend editor Carey Greenberg-Berger.
The Consumerist focuses on complaints submitted to the editors from real consumers facing, or having faced real problems. The Consumerist often takes the submitted complaints to another level by conducting additional research, attempting to provide the most comprehensive analysis on the given situation.
Another intriguing aspect of The Consumerist's services is the occasional "Phone Numbers" posts. These "Phone Numbers" posts give disgruntled users who are upset with frustrating customer service and tech support lines another option -- the ability to talk to the source. In one of the most recent posts, The Consumerist says "if you have a Verizon landline issue that has been escalated to management but you're still not getting a satisfactory answer, you may want to try kicking it up to the CEO," included are the phone and fax numbers to the CEO's office, as well as the company's Executive Customer Support.
Reader submitted complaints, news of noteworthy scams and stories of poor customer service take up the bulk of The Consumerist's content. Claims vary from the case of an AOL subscriber's recorded conversation of his attempts to cancel his service, to a man's disdain as he was stranded in a foreign country without access to his Bank Of America account after being assured by the company that he would have no problems with access.
One of The Consumerist's most popular topics is the ongoing saga of Walmart's selling of a men's t-shirt donning the Nazi 3rd SS Division Totenkopf symbol. Upon The Consumerist's coverage of the story in November of 2006, Walmart issued an apology and announced that they would be pulling all said t-shirts off the shelves. Consumerist readers began submitting sightings of the shirts at various Walmart locations in the days, weeks and months following the debacle, with the most recent found on a clearance rack on February 24, 2008. The story that originated from a blogger's submission to The Consumerist gained attention from nearly every major media outlet, and as a result, garnered action from Congress in the form of a letter to Walmart's CEO H. Lee Scott urging Walmart to remove the insignias from shelves.
The Consumerist is a profound resource for weary consumers to educate themselves on some of the malicious and otherwise disagreeable operations of some of today's biggest corporations.
The Consumerist is owned by blogging stronghold, Gawker Media, and is run by editor Ben Popken, senior editor Meghann Marco, associate editor Chris Walters, and weekend editor Carey Greenberg-Berger.
The Consumerist focuses on complaints submitted to the editors from real consumers facing, or having faced real problems. The Consumerist often takes the submitted complaints to another level by conducting additional research, attempting to provide the most comprehensive analysis on the given situation.
Another intriguing aspect of The Consumerist's services is the occasional "Phone Numbers" posts. These "Phone Numbers" posts give disgruntled users who are upset with frustrating customer service and tech support lines another option -- the ability to talk to the source. In one of the most recent posts, The Consumerist says "if you have a Verizon landline issue that has been escalated to management but you're still not getting a satisfactory answer, you may want to try kicking it up to the CEO," included are the phone and fax numbers to the CEO's office, as well as the company's Executive Customer Support.
Reader submitted complaints, news of noteworthy scams and stories of poor customer service take up the bulk of The Consumerist's content. Claims vary from the case of an AOL subscriber's recorded conversation of his attempts to cancel his service, to a man's disdain as he was stranded in a foreign country without access to his Bank Of America account after being assured by the company that he would have no problems with access.
One of The Consumerist's most popular topics is the ongoing saga of Walmart's selling of a men's t-shirt donning the Nazi 3rd SS Division Totenkopf symbol. Upon The Consumerist's coverage of the story in November of 2006, Walmart issued an apology and announced that they would be pulling all said t-shirts off the shelves. Consumerist readers began submitting sightings of the shirts at various Walmart locations in the days, weeks and months following the debacle, with the most recent found on a clearance rack on February 24, 2008. The story that originated from a blogger's submission to The Consumerist gained attention from nearly every major media outlet, and as a result, garnered action from Congress in the form of a letter to Walmart's CEO H. Lee Scott urging Walmart to remove the insignias from shelves.
The Consumerist is a profound resource for weary consumers to educate themselves on some of the malicious and otherwise disagreeable operations of some of today's biggest corporations.
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