Business

2007: THE YEAR OF THE CONSUMER

By Dave Lowther ⋅ February 4, 2008 ⋅  Print this post ⋅ Post a comment

AS SOCIAL NETWORKS HERALD A CHANGE, WHAT WILL 2008 BRING?

Last year marked the beginning of a revolution; wronged customers stood up, proclaimed their rights and sparked a series of corporate back-flips, reversals and U-turns over everything from Mars bars to excessive bank charges.

In the business world 2007 is being hailed as “The Year of Consumer Power.” The opportunity for unparalleled campaigning via websites and social networks has achieved massive victories on many different issues, plus take into account the growing popularity of price comparison websites, and it’s spelling bad news for big businesses.

Ed Mayo, the chief executive of the National Consumer Council, explains: “Complaining used to be a lonely battle; now it’s becoming a team activity. If there is one thing that will keep the chief executives awake at night, it’s the sight of people using websites like YouTube and social networks such as Facebook to mount concerted campaigns against the failings of any company.

Last year thousands of vegetarians, and some non-vegetarians too, bombarded the Mars UK office, with emails, phone-calls and print-outs of Facebook petitions after Mars began to use animal products in its chocolate.

Fiona Dawson, managing director of Mars UK, explained: “The consumer is our boss – and we had lots of feedback from customers who were unhappy about the change. It became very clear, very quickly that we had made a mistake. After listening to their views we decided to reverse our decision.”

And at the beginning of term last year, a Facebook group protested against plans by HSBC to scrap interest free overdrafts. After over 6,000 students voiced their concerns the bank decided to freeze interest on graduate overdrafts and have even offered refunds to recent graduates who were subject to the additional interest charge.

It’s not just businesses that are being affected, the popularity of downloading has led to bands such as Radiohead boycotting the record company and releasing their new album online, asking fans to pay whatever they think it’s worth.

Although we can use the traditional methods of protest, new technology has given us great new power. Anyone with internet access can change the balance of power on any issue they feel strongly about, whether it’s challenging a business over its ingredients or its human rights policies. With little cost and regardless of geographical location we can now help others get a better deal.

Will 2008 be the end of shoddy service, dodgy dealings and rip-off rates? Probably not, but at least we’ll know which companies to avoid.