Comments on: Did PETCO kill the squirrel? http://blog.foghound.com/2009/10/did-petco-kill-the-squirrel/ News and views about marketing and communications Sat, 20 Mar 2010 21:15:02 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Lois Kelly http://blog.foghound.com/2009/10/did-petco-kill-the-squirrel/comment-page-1/#comment-53278 Lois Kelly Fri, 30 Oct 2009 13:18:17 +0000 http://blog.foghound.com/?p=665#comment-53278 Currie, If the public sentiment is made public and loud, even utility monopolies can change. The trick is creating a groundswell of angry sentiment among many consumers and influencers -- and becoming a thorn in the side of the utility. Many consumers have formed blogs/sites "I hate (name of org.)" or "org. sucks," and they use Twitter to stir things up. Of course, this takes work, so people usually just pay the over-charge and fume. I do believe, however, that the power of social networks can change even the big monopolies. Currie,
If the public sentiment is made public and loud, even utility monopolies can change. The trick is creating a groundswell of angry sentiment among many consumers and influencers — and becoming a thorn in the side of the utility. Many consumers have formed blogs/sites “I hate (name of org.)” or “org. sucks,” and they use Twitter to stir things up. Of course, this takes work, so people usually just pay the over-charge and fume. I do believe, however, that the power of social networks can change even the big monopolies.

]]> By: Currie http://blog.foghound.com/2009/10/did-petco-kill-the-squirrel/comment-page-1/#comment-52958 Currie Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:21:40 +0000 http://blog.foghound.com/?p=665#comment-52958 So is there a way that word of mouth can effect irresponsible merchants when they aren't competing for your business? Our gas company--Laclede Gas of St. Louis--ignored our request to cancel service at our old apartment and over-billed as a result. After paying more than the portion we owed and spending more than four hours on the phone and writing letters explaining our case they just sent us a very rude final collection notice for the remainder of the illicit bill. Since I don't have time to fight them, I have to just pay it. I'd like to change to a competitor but the only way to do that would be to change out all our appliances for electric; highly impractical and I know from other people's experiences that the electric company is no better. It seems that on some level, though, negative public sentiment towards irresponsible utility monopolies must have an effect on the company--but does it? So is there a way that word of mouth can effect irresponsible merchants when they aren’t competing for your business?

Our gas company–Laclede Gas of St. Louis–ignored our request to cancel service at our old apartment and over-billed as a result. After paying more than the portion we owed and spending more than four hours on the phone and writing letters explaining our case they just sent us a very rude final collection notice for the remainder of the illicit bill. Since I don’t have time to fight them, I have to just pay it.

I’d like to change to a competitor but the only way to do that would be to change out all our appliances for electric; highly impractical and I know from other people’s experiences that the electric company is no better.

It seems that on some level, though, negative public sentiment towards irresponsible utility monopolies must have an effect on the company–but does it?

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