We introduced Jose, the FedEx furniture guy, to the blogging world after we discovered his fedexfurniture site. The site recently received a redesign check it out here: http://furniture.weblogswork.com. On a side note, 20/20 just recorded a piece in his apartment on the 15th. Literally, this story will never die…
We first reblogged a MAKE: story about a guy named Jose who built an apartment full of furniture out of FedEx boxes. You can follow the thread here. I figured the story was basically over (it has lasted for more than a month), until my wife and I were watching MSNBC last night and saw Jose on a program called Countdown(that is my son in the background asking what I was doing). The story about the "FedEx Furniture Guy" lasted more than two minutes and included a live interview. Next, this morning Jose was on the Today show for more than three minutes. I understand he will be on Good Morning America later this week and Inside Edition on Friday. I assume the next step is the late night shows: Leno, Letterman and Kimmel? Will it be over then? Or maybe there will be a national book tour, a movie of the week, or maybe a SIM video game?
ABC News recently visited Jose, the FedEx Furniture Guy, for a spot to be aired on Good Morning America next week. The ‘Cribs’ style segment will feature the new ‘FedEx Furniture Lifestyle’ that Jose has made so popular.
The Good Morning American segment is only one of several television appearances Jose has made in the past few weeks. He has made the rounds of all the major (and minor) news outlets including CNN, CNBC, NBC, CBS, and ABC. In total, over one hour of national programming in the past month has been dedicated to his furnishings and his plight and fight to keep his website up. Jose was contacted by Riverston Publishing about the possibility of writing a book about his adventure and a museum has offered to diplay his ‘art’ in their collection. Jose has been a busy boy!
Web traffic has been significant. Over 500,000 unique Internet users who have visited his site and/or blog. Thousands of people have emailed him, and hundreds have left comments on his website. Icerocket indicates that over 597 bloggers have written about FedEx Furniture. Some of the bloggers are mad angry (actually more surprised than angry) that he has received so much attention, others suspect that we made him up and many more thought the stunt was funny. Interestingly, many folks in the PR business want the entire story to go away. Don’t worry, it will. But clearly FedEx could have been on the good side of this 15 60 minutes of fame - instead of playing the villian…
More from Jose Avila. We asked him 3Q’s:
Q: What did you hope to gain by putting up the site?
The reason I wanted to put up the site was to go out to the world and say "It’s OK to be ghetto! When you are in a bind, and feeling down, you can be creative." I figured that maybe at least one person would see the site that was in a bad situation, get a laugh out of it, and think to them selves "Hey at least I’m not that guy!"
Q: Do you think you would have reacted differently had you been approached differently?
I was only approached by FedEx’s legal department. Had I been approached differently I probably would have reacted differently. Had they asked me to change the domain name, change the colors etc. I would have more than considered changing those things. When this whole thing started I did not have legal representation, and had I been approached in a less threating manner, and not told that there were no other options, would not have even started looking for a lawyer.
Q: Where does this go from here? Why don’t you just take the site down and avoid the hassle?
It goes where it goes… At what point do you stand down and give up your rights? When do you let in. Ever since my lawyers have advised me that there is nothing legally wrong with what I am doing, I feel that if i take down the site and avoid the hassle, it will give the message "It’s OK to push around the guy smaller than you". I don’t believe that it is OK to do that, just as it is was not OK to bully around the kids in lower grades in school.
Jeremy Pepper puts on his reporter hat and gets everyone’s side of the story in this post. He gets Sandra Munoz, of FedEx corporate communications, to talk about their approach to the story:
We have not officially responded because no one has really contacted the media department for a response. Those people that have called, like a TV station, we do respond to. We did miss the Wired.com request.
Right now, it’s about media coverage. Right now, maybe this has run its course with the traditional media, it was the flavor of the week. That’s what it is about with public relations - you look at the situation, weigh the damage, and make decisions. You do make your decisions on what you do and do not respond to. And, that’s not just FedEx, but that’s likely all corporations that are weighing the upside and downside in responding to media and citizen media. You can’t always respond to everything, because of timing. Wired.com is a perfect example - the request came in over email, and got lost in the shuffle.
I believe that the first contact with Jose Avila - the official contact - was through the attorney. If we go online and see a company using the FedEx name, it goes to legal. That’s not unusual. It’s a legal issue.
We’re just asking him to respect our rights. Thousands of our employees have built the company to what it is today. All we’re asking him to do is respect our name and materials, and stop using them for his Website and his endeavors. That’s all it comes down to."
Jeremy also includes a long IM transcript with Jose Avila. Check it out.
John Wagner (whose On Message blog we think rocks — it’s all about the niche) manages to blend a whole series of current memes in this great post on how the FedExFurniture thing might be handled. Read the whole post. Some bits:
I don’t see the connection between boxes as furniture and successful package shipping. Okay, the boxes are sturdy. But that’s not really a competitive advantage. I’m not alone in that view.I also doubt that FedEx wants people bogarting boxes all around the country to make divans for their apartments.
At the same time, the whole "cease and desist" approach always strikes me as overkill — especially when it’s the big bad corporate lawyers shutting down the little guy’s right to have fun.
There’s probably a middle ground there … one that involves dialog and resolution rather than a marketing campaign or a lawsuit.
The problem is that this issue is one that most companies aren’t well-suited to tackle. The approach depends on the department with responsibility."
Q: What lessons does the FedExFurniture.com fracas have to teach us as communications managers? Should FedEx have blogged their response? Do we think that every major brand needs such an open communications channel to respond to every blip that will appear in the new networked world?
B.L. Ochman’s answer to our question, just in:
I think Fed Ex could have had a sense of humor and ignored the kid.
I certainly don’t think every major brand needs a blog. Most of them would just be filled with corporate bullshit, and nobody wants to read that.
Nor do companies need to respond to every blip in the blogosphere. But they need to monitor what is being said about them and decide on a case by case basis when to jump in.
If I were advising FedEx right now, I’d tell them that this will blow over, but that they better think about what their blog response policy is and whether they need a blog."
Lots of chatter about the good, bad & ugly associated with FedExFurniture. PR and marketing folks don’t really seem to be in agreement about how it should have been handled. Here’s the list of posts we’ve made on this since the story first broke on the MAKE blog.
Here’s a quick roundup of various views posted so far:
Since there isn’t a clear consensus, I thought it might be timely to ask everyone to elaborate a bit more. Weigh in on what we might all do should one of our clients or companies face such an issue. I’m circulating questions and posting up the feedback I get. Comments, links and opinions are invited.
So:
Q: What lessons does the FedExFurniture.com fracas have to teach us as communications managers? Should FedEx have blogged their response? Do we think that every major brand needs such an open communications channel to respond to every blip that will appear in the new networked world?
I’ll start with my take on these. I think we’re not in Kansas anymore. It’s simple for anyone to cook up a video, record a podcast, whip up a quick blog and start talking. Some will be enthusiasts for your product (e.g. HackingNetflix, The Virtual Weber Bullet), some will not be. Some will just be doing something off the wall. Like building furniture out of your packing material. During the FC Now Blogjam, we talked about these same issues — are you ready for DIY media?
I think FedEx should have communicated in more ways than a legal document. They absolutely have a point, but what if it had gone something like "Hey, Jose, interesting site. We’re glad to hear that our boxes are so sturdy, you can even sleep on them. Very inventive. Can we have a piece for our corporate HQ when you’re done? Now, here’s our problem: your site might confuse our customers. It looks like we might have done it, our colors, our name, etc. Can you change it up so that it doesn’t look like ours? Change the URL? We love your creativity, but, obviously, we can’t have everyone build furniture with our stuff. You can see why that would cause problems for us. Plus, we invest a lot of money to make the FedEx name mean something very specific." And so on. Maybe we get a different outcome. Certainly they could have gone public with their side of the story, and I think most folks would get it. But the legal tactic overwhelmed their story, and the PR has suffered as a result.
Should every company blog? Probably not. But they have to listen, I think, and figure out the right threshold for responding. In my view, that bar is trending downward, the need for more nuance and responsiveness increasing. These things have a shelf life, and you’ll end up winning more advocates, I think, by responding than by stonewalling. But, I’m eager to hear what others have to say.
Jose, the FedEx Furniture guy, has been making the rounds on national media today. First up was CBN, then HDNet (Mark Cuban’s HDTV network), then CBS, tomorrow ABC and if Jose has time - NBC later this week. (update: CNN Headline News just covered Jose) The conversation is happening. What does FedEx have to say now?
"We want him to take down the site, even though we don’t have a legal right to make him."
Jose made this home movie of the CBS affliate’s interview this afternoon. Looking at the server logs over 150,000 people from across the globe have visited Jose’s FedEx Furniture site (more than 14,000 have visited our stories on Jose). According to the logs, visitors from FedEx, UPS and DHL have visited our stories so we know YOU are listening. Perhaps it is time to start talking. Get ‘in’ the story. Take a risk.
Update: Mixed response among PR mavens:
Steve Rubel says FedEx missed a great opportunity for citizen marketing.
B.L. Ochman dubs the affair a bad PR move.
Jeremy Pepper says we’re kinda nuts — FedEx is doing exactly the right thing.
Allan Jenkins says Jose is just the flavor of the month in an ongoing blogger v. BigCo dynamic. And that we’re kinda nuts.
Folks. Here’s our point: whatever FedEx’s position relative to the marketing value of Jose’s creative work, from a communications standpoint they have let the lawsuit do the talking. A simple post, explaining in a straightforward, human voice, why the existence of FedExFurniture.com was a problem for them would have done wonders to help tamp it down. At least balance out the story people had to tell. As is, it’s little hacker with no furniture v. BigCo and the DMCA. As you PR types know, no one ever roots for the Empire.
US Attorney Terrell Harris of Memphis resigned today and will join FedEx in the legal department. Too bad FedEx didn’t consider hiring Steve Rubel or Brian Oberkirch.
[via]
FedEx,
In early July our firm contacted your public relations department and suggested a possible response to the FedEx Furniture Guy. Our calls and emails went unanswered. There is a conversation taking place about FedEx and yet, your voice is largely silent. There are a million productive ways to respond to Jose’s project. Instead your firm has threatened legal action against a kid who can’t even afford furniture for his apartment. I have seen the letters and briefs your company has prepared and filed with the court - how many hours have your lawyers spent on this? It is late, but not too late to turn this opportunity around for the benefit of FedEx, its shareholders, and its customers. If you would like to discuss the options please feel free to give me a call at 214.550.2003 (ask for Alexander Muse).
Regards,
Alexander Muse
Update: Now, with the story slashdotted, more nasty conversation. Sure you don’t want a quick means to speak to this story?
Extra update: At least some FedExers are taking to their personal blogs and talking about the creativity involved here.
Wired has a story today about the super resourceful FedExFurniture project. We helped Jose set up the blog for his site, so we’re glad to see the story have, er, legs. (Did he build legs for the FedExFurniture?).
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