JB Hi-Fi’s identity mix-up: did it damage the brand or was it handled with ‘grace and style’?
JB Hi-Fi has earned praise for its crisis management handling over an incident where a man with Down Syndrome was wrongly banned from a store, although the manager’s refusal to initially apologise has done it “much damage” according to one PR expert.
According to news reports, 21-year-old James Milne was barred from going into the store after a security guard said he looked like a man on the “no entry list”, a decision that was then supported by the JB Hi-Fi store manager, despite the man’s family pointing out the banned man – who also had Down Syndrome – was clearly not Milne.
The store initially refused to apologise over the incident, however JB Hi-Fi CEO Richard Murray did issue an apology yesterday afternoon after Milne’s sister took to Facebook to complain about the incident.
JB Hi-Fi’s apology
In a statement, Murray said: “We should have done better yesterday. We are going to make sure that we learn from this and do better in the future.
“I have sent a personal letter of apology to James and we are continuing to endeavour to contact the family to apologise directly.”
For Red Agency Brisbane’s principal Yasmine Gray an initial apology from the store “would have gone a long way to buying them time to then address the issue further”.
“Instead they inflamed the situation by refusing to communicate, and with something as emotive as this just added fuel to the fire,” she said.
“The CEO’s apologetic comments that followed, whilst necessary, now of course lack authenticity and credibility and much damage has been done.
Gray
“JB Hi-Fi will have to do something very significant now to address this issue if it wants its audience to believe that it cares. Brands need to understand that in this world of engagement and instant communication that compassionate, agile response is vital to positive connection with their target market. Anything less will get a response such as we saw yesterday.”
However Tony Jaques, owner and director of strategic consulting company Issues Outcomes, believes the company, and the CEO, handled the matter “with grace and style”.
“To me this is a classic example of what happens when a company is held responsible for the actions of an individual employee, in this case the store manager who reportedly supported the action of a security guard,” he said.
Jaques
“When such things happen it can be very tempting to throw the employee under the bus, and there have been many instances where a company has dismissed an employee as a way to protect its brand and create distance from inappropriate behaviour. But a responsible CEO also needs to be seen to be fair to his or her employees.
“The CEO of JB Hi-Fi clearly said the store manager could have handled it better, but he didn’t try to defend or explain the action of his employee and he didn’t try to distance the company from the incident.
“Instead he took personal responsibility for what had happened, he apologised and he committed to doing things better. In my view he followed the textbook to the letter, with grace and style.”
For Magnum PR founder Michelle Hampton the brand “handled the situation reasonably well” and it was evident JB Hi-Fi “have a well-oiled crisis protocol”.
“From a crisis management perspective, I think the brand handled the situation reasonably well. It’s clear they have a well-oiled crisis protocol that kicked into gear very quickly yesterday,” she said.
Hampton
“It had all the workings of a typical damage control rollout – company statement was issued, key spokesperson offered for interviews, direct communication with the family, and public promises to learn from this incident
“From a PR perspective, it’s becoming a little predictable that things like this, given the power of social media, are almost guaranteed to blow up into huge/big/scaring/cataclysmic PR disasters,” she added.
Amanda Purdie, Edelman Melbourne director of corporate, was in agreement, saying: “JB Hi-Fi swung into a pretty classic crisis management mode, and handled it as well as could be expected”.
“The CEO Richard Murray was accessible to the media; he said all the right things; and made a personal apology to James Milne and his family,” she said.
Purdie
“I believed him when he said he was sorry, and he came across as a good guy, which is half the battle.
“An important aspect is that he said JB Hi-Fi was committed to learning from the incident and it would feed into improving their customer experience across their stores. It is important to follow through on this and equally a good opportunity for them to reach into the community in a meaningful way.
“They would need to report back on their actions to various stakeholders, including the Qld Down Syndrome Association who also got involved in the media commentary.
“In summary, zero out of ten marks for the Mt Ommaney store manager, and a good seven out of ten for Richard Murray.”
Miranda Ward
Miranda Ward worked for Mumbrella from 2013 to 2017, eventually becoming deputy editor. Miranda joined Mumbrella in September 2013 from Sky News.
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A generic release with a generic quote. the way that reads is “uggggh, what a pain. we’re saying sorry because we have to. now lets all move along”
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I reserve my judgement because I wasn’t there. JB could have handled it correctly, with the protagonist kicking up a major scene/stink – then played the Down Syndrome card in the media.
Or the store security person may have had a chip on their shoulder. And wanted to save face by maintaining their stance.
People are not against people. People are for themselves.
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I bought a new HP printer from JB HiFi today. This story did not affect my buying habits one little bit.
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Every company no matter how great can still get a bad wrap because of the actions of one bad employee.
For the most part I find JB-Hifi a pleasure to shop at. Their salespeople seem like they genuinely enjoy helping customers, because they enjoy working there. I love their review blurb placards on the movies, games and albums too.
It’s a shame that this family had such a negative experience, but the actions of the employee were certainly not mandated by corporate policy and rather by personal incompetence.
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A rare misstep from JB HiFi in my opinion. I always get truly excellent service at my local store (Bondi Jct), far better than David Jones for example.
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This article is a massive suck. Shame Mumbrella.
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I would have hoped some of this media attention might have led to a bit of a look at JB’s sale pricing strategy as uncovered on reddit last week: https://www.reddit.com/r/australia/comments/3l8k8m/wow_jbhifi_having_20_sony_car_sound_sale_except/
Here’s a pretty image that pretty much sums it up:
http://i.imgur.com/vqgYs00.jpg
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So JB HiFi staff carry pictures of barred customers on their phones and they show these photos to other customers while indicating these people are barred for whatever reason.
How does this stand with privacy legislation? Are the customers on the barred list aware that their photos have been taken and that they are barred from any or all stores for whatever reason? Under the privacy legislation have they been offered the opportunity to review this information or have it removed? Where were the images obtained from and is it legal to lift images from CCTV footage for this purpose or were the pictures taken by a staff member with a mobile phone? How widely have the images been circulated: in store to only one phone, in store to the phones of multiple staff members, or across multiple stores or even to other organisations plus their shopping centres.
Tha fact that one person was barred is just the tip of the iceberg.
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Remind me not to recommend Issues Outcomes to my network then. Has Jaques seen the JB Hifi facebook page, and how people reacted to the apology? It didn’t cut it. Murray’s apology was compulsory but not sufficient in this case. What people wanted was that the conduct of the staff involved should have serious consequences. It ends up looking that the people responsible are hiding behind the skirts of their CEO. At the end of the day,
To follow up the apology, JB Hifi could do much worse than sacking the responsible staff. It would be a good lesson (‘training’) for the rest of the staff too. “If you act in an arrogant way, where you could be in the wrong, and then you end up severely embarrassing your employer in public, you may get fired”. The public will be satisfied, and the staff responsible probably wouldn’t make a legal fuss for fear of being named in public and have the internet lynch mob after them.
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I found JB Hi-Fi’s “apology” completely lacking. The manager who banned the customer because he looked like some other banned customer whose picture was apparently on the phone of a security guard (and what is up with that?) has not apologised. And it could have been handled better? Really? Wow, could it? You know, I think maybe it could have! Thanks for pointing that out, Mr CEO! The fact that they have kept that manager and, presumably, the security guard, on staff says to me that they’re happy to have stubborn fools with no people skills in management positions.
I’m the parent of a disabled child (not Down Syndrome), and I will not be shopping at JB Hi-Fi again. I’ve asked family members who generally give our kids JB Hi-Fi gift certificates to please give them gift certificates from some other store. I realise this was an isolated incident, but if that’s the kind of manager JB Hi-Fi is happy to have working for them, I’m happy to shop somewhere else.
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As someone who works with and has a passion for working with people with additional needs, this incident is appalling and disgraceful! Someone has to man up and stand up to take responsibility and appropriate actions ought to be taken for those directly involved. This beautiful young man was discriminated against in the most humiliating, hurtful way possible and sadly a “sorry” from higher powers within the company will not cut it, and rightly so! Imagine if it was your son, daughter or any other family member for that matter whom was discriminated against, I’m sure you wouldn’t sit back and sit in silence. I for one will be boycotting JB Hi-Fi to make a point that this behaviour is never acceptable and never will be!
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IT WILL CERTAINLY CHANGE MINE, LAST ON THE LIST.
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