Earlier today I was in a zoom meeting with some friends / business colleagues / fellow volunteers and after our meeting ended we stayed around for a general chat. We touched on how our respective businesses and organisations were moving forward and the difficulties many will face regarding adaptation of workplaces in older buildings, phasing the return of staff to accommodate their continuing childcare needs and given the financial uncertainty many families are facing, whether a couple of the more 'luxury' businesses would survive.
I have permission to share the conversation but cannot identify the business incase either of the directors of Mrs Meldrum Limited decide to dox / harass
This Scottish business is concerned in high end bespoke jewellery and rely on word of mouth recommendation as each commission is unique to the client and images of those commissions are never used for advertising as they feel that those images belong solely to the client. They also make several pieces each year which are donated to charities close to their hearts for fundraising purposes. In times of recession / financial hardship, luxury items are the first to go, so as a company they had considered (amongst other options) approaching a Scottish influencer and offer them the opportunity to work on a project over a period of a few weeks documenting the process of a client collaborating in the design of a piece of jewellery, choosing stones, metal to be used, through to manufacture of the final piece(s). I use the plural as they had thought that small inexpensive pieces could have been made in silver with gold detail for the girls and a significant piece of jewellery for the 'influencer' which they would have been able to keep. The fee to the influencer would have been small as the final piece of diamond set jewellery could have had a retail value of several thousand pounds. The project would have showcased their work and that a commission could be as small or as large as you want it to be but personal and unique.
Mrs Meldrum had been mentioned to them as an influencer in this area with a large following as well as couple of others, so a few family members and friends of the business either followed or checked in on the instagram accounts to gauge engagement / content etc and feedback their views. On one post someone had left a comment to Rebecca, not disagreeing with her but putting across a point of view to which Rebecca replied. The comment was liked by several people, one of which was one of the family members, as it related to something she is passionate about and the following day when going on to check what was new on Instagram she found that Rebecca had blocked her. This person had never commented but had 'liked' a couple of Rebecca's posts she had put up previously and this one comment, which resulted in being blocked. No engagement, just blocked.
Following on from this, the company decided to look into the online presence of Rebecca further, and of course Lees account and decided that to be associated with them could only harm their business. I listened quietly to the conversation today and 'smug' 'brash' 'entitled' 'uneducated' 'childish' and 'exploitative of their children' were all terms used to describe the Meldrums and their accounts. All these descriptive terms totally at odds with the ethos of the company that were looking to potentially collaborate with them.
A decision has been made that they will instead put that budget towards making and donating five pieces of jewellery for charitable purposes and those charities today were identified and contacted.
In so many of the threads on here, we read about or discuss brands and products that Rebecca or Lee have promoted / advertised / affiliate linked and the fallout / tantrums when sometimes they make a complete balls up through ill thought out posts, inconsistent information and inappropriate behaviour such as the two finger, middle finger, no f*cks given attitude. What we do not know about are those companies and individuals who do their research and decide against even making contact. Rebecca rails about the 'trolls' 'losers' and 'jealous' individuals who have caused contracts to potentially be ended prematurely but does she ever think about the business she has never gained because of her attitude, poor judgement and behaviour. This is the second 'bespoke' collaboration that I know of that did not proceed any further than the investigative stage, surely there must be dozens more.
It gives me comfort a brand doing proper due diligence research.
Must take them so much time block people who liked a slightly negative comment or a polite comment or question that dident align with the meldrum.
I'm always baffled by limiting comments on brand posts how can brands be happy with that surely they paying the infleuncers to advertise and engage with people.
Their engagement is shocking as so many comments get deleted.
So many nice comments never so much as get a heart or responded too.
Especially on her Facebook page.
They seem to think if they block or delete then issues gone away not realising it's harder to delete a digital footprint.
For all they know their images if Mrs meldrum and their children could be on dodgy websites.
I worry about lack safeguarding and how easy they make a potential deranged fan to stalk them.
What's the purpose of lees Instagram
I can't beleive he gets brand work including child safety on the internet with Google I mean how could Google think he was applicable?
They would never have brought a Lexus and neither of them like fine wines and think it's funny to make out they drinking and driving.
There's been twice said lees stepping back not being a influencer.
I had hoped his getting his old job back might make them more normal.
But he still wants fame so does she.
She hates being a sahm mum.
She hates being hands on and spending will time with her kids.
She's been worst example dog owner since the impulse brought a dog.
It's interesting that despite their many deleted posts the company was able gauge accurate account of what they like from their 2 Instagram accounts.
So maybe they not as clever as they think.
They probably still holding out for gifted kitchen or holiday once pandemic is over.