Some background: Blake Collins (disclosure: a friend, plus I officiated his wedding) wrote a one-star Yelp review of the new World of Beer location downtown. He’s not the only person to give the place a bad review (nine of the fifteen reviews are one or two stars, although, to be fair, there are four five star reviews), but the fact that Blake works at the nearby Good Oak Bar seemed to upset whoever holds the keys to the WOB Facebook account, so this went public on Saturday night:

BLAKE C…show your face little girl…anyone know this little diaper boy? We gotta start calling these little girls out! Our owners and managers, all from Tucson, work to bring hundreds of beers here, and work with our local brewers to bring dozens of beers that this little sissy has never seen and this little un-potty trained kid has gotta hate on us and try to bring our friends like Tap & Bottle into the fold? Who is this little girl that hates job creators and local beer?

It didn’t take long for a stream of confused comments to follow (including mine, remarking on the fact that we were witnessing a social media trainwreck in real time), but any comment that was even mildly negative or perplexed was quickly deleted. In my case, my comment was expunged and I was blocked from World of Beer’s page. The only comment that did seem to stay online was one from someone who offered to punch Blake in the face if World of Beer would give him a job. In fact, World of Beer Tucson “liked” that remark. After a while, the whole thread was deleted, seemingly never to be acknowledged again.

I don’t have much room to talk about responding emotionally on Facebook (although I did leave my post up, for what that’s worth), and yes, I understand the feeling when someone seemingly bad-mouths your employer when they may have a conflict of interest, but nearly all of the ways of going about addressing that sort of thing would be better than a somewhat misogynist rant (and one with a relatively limited vocabulary insult-wise as well…we get it, diapers, baby, potty-training, enough already).

Oddly enough, part of Blake’s shot at World of Beer was that it caters to a “bro” audience which the response only works to confirm. There’s clearly room for plenty of places to drink downtown serving a variety of audiences and based on everything I’ve heard, it would appear World of Beer will be fine, but for awhile on Saturday night, it appears they were aiming to discourage people from ever stopping in.

This article appears in Nov 7-13, 2013.

The editor of the Tucson Weekly. I have no idea how I got here.

39 replies on “This Week in Social Media Disasters: World of Beer Edition”

  1. That was a terrible way to handle that. At least get some class if you’re going to call someone out. Be professional, your representing your business.

  2. I went there before All Souls. The 20-year old waitress (who was very sweet) said she was too young too drink, but she could suggest beers based on how they smell. They were out of all wheat beers, so she suggested my wife get a cider instead…pause…
    In the bathroom, a dude stormed in and yelled “I CAME FOR THE BEER, BUT I’M STAYING FOR THE PUSSY!!!”.

    The fried shrimp was good.

    There. There’s my review. I’ll just put it here instead of Yelp.

  3. What’s disappointing is that WOB had to attack the writer rather than respond to what he wrote. Since they knew nothing about him, they went to that time-honored strategy of all ignorant men. They called him a sissy. Although I must admit I had never heard the not-yet-potty-trained one. Shows some creativity. Methinks the writer must have had, or still does, problems in the continence department. Which would explain the rage.

  4. General rule of thumb on social media business pages… NEVER… Never engage in or start a war of words on your business page. Does not matter if you are right. People who know nothing about your business will chime in just for the sport of it. It will snowball out of control. AND if someone puts up an argument you disagree with, the last thing you should do is delete the comment or block the person from the page. WOB served themselves up a large glass of bitter beer and it does not sound like it went down smooth at all. Time to hire a real social media manager, not just some easily shaken employee that is too emotionally attached to the business to know when to it is better to take the high road and shut up. Aside from the facebook rant… Yelp does give businesses the opportunity to respond to reviews. A nicely worded, well thought out response could have gone a long way. Way too late for that now.

  8. Haven’t yet gone to WOB, and now not sure I will. Cranky – Borderlands has the best looking tap room in Tucson, and awesome staff, but unfortunately I didn’t like any of their beers very much, except Citrana which is wildly unique and delicious. I find the beer at Dragoon and 1055 to be a lot better, but they don’t have the ambiance of the BL tap room, that’s for sure.

  9. WOB – good luck, you are offending a certain demographic with disposable income.. and we are happy to dispose of it elsewhere.

  10. Ha! This is adorable. Nothing brings in business faster than publicly acting like a child. On the other hand they don’t seem to have the comment on their FB page.

  11. WOB has an amazing selection of beer, no one can deny this.

    BUT, my experience there a few weeks ago was less than amazing. it took 15+mins for someone to come take our order, and another 5 mins for our beers to be delivered.

    Far too many places downtown with good or great beer selections to support a business that pulls this kind of BS on a customer. I get pulling down the rant, but offer a very sincere and very very public apology in its place.

  12. I just find it perplexing that they’d say that their work with local brewers brings beers that Blake has “never seen” when Good Oak attempts to serve as many local brews as they possibly can.

  13. As a lady beer drinker (with that sweet, sweet disposable income) I’ll stay out of any establishment whose management can’t come up with a better insult than my gender.

  15. Hello everyone, we at World of Beer certainly understand the negative responses with regard to this post and its offensive nature, and we appreciative your feedback. We regret that an unhappy employee gained access to the WOB Tucson Facebook page last Saturday and wrote a very disturbing post directed at a customer. We must apologize that this happened and must also accept and apologize that we allowed this to happen. We have taken all steps to ensure that this does not happen again and that we do not retain or employ individuals that do not appreciate our customers and our community. While WOB Tucson is a franchise, our tavern is Tucson owned, managed by Tucson natives, and we can assure you that we take this very seriously and it has been addressed. Thank you for your understanding.

  16. How conveniently you’ve neglected to mention that your friend’s post, while giving the establishment one star, read in its entirety: “Come on bro, this place has it all. Beers, over priced food, and TV. I think I’ll stick with Tap and Bottle.”

    While this didn’t merit the response it got, it’s pretty easy to determine the objective of a nonsensical low review posted by an employee of a bar located less than a block away from World of Beer.

  17. Landon, while I appreciate the acknowledgement of the situation, WOB – Tucson’s FB page has blocked my friend and me from posting on their page after trying to bring this situation to light. It’s unnerving that they are treating potential customers like this.

  18. Hi Chuck, please check your “other” inbox on Facebook regarding this. I sent you a private message. Thank you.

  21. Landon, it might be a good idea for you folks to hire some experienced PR counsel as you get your business up and running.

  22. Z: I said this in the post: “[Y]es, I understand the feeling when someone seemingly bad-mouths your employer when they may have a conflict of interest…”

    Should I have elaborated further? Even if Blake’s review was intended to be sinister in nature (I don’t think it was), WoB still handled this all wrong.

  23. Landon Evans – You may claim that your “tavern is Tucson owned”, but online records say otherwise. The DLLC lists ownership as Public House Tucson, LLC which has a Florida address and lists Michael Zembillas who is a Florida resident. Furthermore, it lists ownership as Public House Holdings, a Florida LLC which also lists Zembillas. I’m not sure what meets your definition of locally owned, but this is not it. Sorry to sidetrack from your social media nightmare, but I could not let you get away with this farce any longer.

  24. I see where the comment was a little emotional and probably posted without a lot of forethought, however I kind of side with WOB here. This Blake fellow is obviously somewhat jealous that this place two doors away is raking in much more business than the very small. limited bar he works at. I love Good Oak. I love WOB. Yeah, its kind of a “bro” audience because its a sports bar near a college campus. Sorry its not hipster enough for you. The ENTIRE point of the craft beer culture and community is to have a sense of support and camaraderie. A prominent bartender at one local craft bar should not be bad mouthing another local(ish) craft bar. The breweries seem to support WOB, both here and in Tempe, so why shouldn’t other bars? Not everyone wants to go drink craft beer and listen to indie rock while discussing mustache styles and scarf choice. Some people like to watch sports while drinking good beer. There aren’t many places that offer that really. I’ll continue to go to both but I feel a little wary about supporting Good Oak when they have people working for them that are so against companionship in the craft community. Yes, whoever works at WOB overreacted a bit but that isn’t intentionally going out and harming the rating of a fellow business because you have a problem with it personally. I am willing to bet that this is the bartender who was there when I came in one night last week. I overheard him telling another group in the bar (with some disdain in his voice) “Yeah, World of Beer is okay but its kind of a…. college crowd.” Umm.. I’m pretty sure all the hipster beer places are kind of a “college” crowd too. Everyone needs to grow up and grow together. Don’t bicker because you’d rather listen to Mumford & Sons than watch the Virginia Picklers kick off against the Florida Ramrods. I don’t prefer music or sports, I just go to these places for good beer.

  25. Bill Clinton: Anyone can set up an LLC in any state. That doesn’t mean they don’t live where the business is operated. There can also be stakeholders and lenders from all over the place, including other companies or peeps. Also, World of Beer employees are from Tucson, they pay taxes in Tucson.

  26. Google the name of the guy who owns the LLC. He doesn’t live here. Employees at all brewpubs and bars in Tucson pay taxes in Tucson so what you said is irrelevant.

  27. humor. you can see that billy is opining on subject matter that he has little or no experience with, not that is not that unusual, and that the post and review referenced in this blurb are either no longer available or never were. solid.

  29. Thanks for the story and all the commentary.

    I’ll stick with having my brew at home, where I can watch what I want, don’t have to deal with a rude staff OR rude customers. And most importantly, I won’t have to deal with traveling to downtown and paying for parking or parking tickets.

  30. WoB needs to invest in some good PR firm. It’s another Amy’s Baking Company in the making. As pointed out it is not locally owned, locally managed yes. Yes, the poster worked for another bar, but he told people to go to a bar that wasn’t the one he worked at. I’d like to know what happened to WoB’s mantra about putting through their employees through intensive beer education, yet they hire a 20 year old that can’t drink. They need to get a clue on how to make the local community like them instead of look at them as a firken joke.

  31. I checked out WOB last night with a couple of friends who were aware of the facebook/yelp exchange. We had a great experience. I usually can’t stand TV filled sports bars (I don’t like watching or listening to sports) but last night they had all the tv’s muted and there was a really talented musician playing all kinds of good cover songs. Also there was an employee either on break or who had just finished his shift when we walked in and he was really helpful with suggestions when we told him what styles of beer we liked. They have petrus aged sour pale ale and Mead on tap! Mead on tap in Tucson! I couldn’t believe it! I don’t even think you can get a glass of mead from a bottle in any restaurant/bar in Tucson, much less on Tap! We had a few beers and sat outside for a couple hours and the employees were really attentive and super friendly. Which was really refreshing given the tendency for a certain hipster pretentiousness that is very detectable in a lot of the newer downtown businesses and is a reason I avoid some places downtown. The whole initial yelp/facebook flap is unfortunate but I don’t think it’s going to have a very big impact on this business in the long run. They have a great location, an amazing product selection-probably the best in Tucson, and the place seemed to be managed really well on the thursday night I was there, so I for one am glad to have yet another great place to enjoy in Tucson.

  33. This while thing is laughable because the other bar owner is not from az but the guys that brought a WOB here are.

  34. The thing that is laughable is people like you believing that people who are local to Tucson own World of Beer. Look above, the facts speak for themselves. ITS A CHAIN STORE so get that in your thick head.

  38. Where did this come from? Who writes all this unfounded bs. The guy that owns the oak shit bar is from New York and doesn’t even live in Tucson.

  39. Destroy the intruders. You don’t have to actually go there to post a review, we’ve done it hundred times. Already made sure they didn’t get to play in the festival with the help of these guys. Keep it spinning…nice job to the guys at TW.

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