Marketing company chases Twitter for $7,000 over 'swag gift box for Elon'
- Reference: 1676985764
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2023/02/21/twitter_swag_elon_lawsuit/
- Source link:
The [1]California-based company describes itself as a "multi-faceted marketing company that, among other things, helps businesses promote themselves by designing, packaging, and distributing branded merchandise to employees and customers."
In a [2]lawsuit [PDF] filed January 6 in the Superior Court of the State of California, Canary said: "The business relationship between Canary and Twitter dates back to 2013; between the start of the relationship in 2013 and August 2022, Canary has delivered more than $10 million of Twitter-branded merchandise to Twitter."
[3]
However, it claims: "Twitter performed on the parties' contract for nearly 10 years, but beginning in September 2022, it stopped paying Canary's invoices. Twitter never complained about the quality of Canary's services or materials, and Twitter never communicated any objections to any invoices. Twitter simply stopped paying. The amount now owing from Twitter to Canary is $392,239.11."
[4]
[5]
Canary lists a number of allegedly unpaid invoices spanning September to November – including one charged at an eye-popping $246,801.63.
We should all know by now (he won't shut up about it) that SpaceX and Tesla mogul Elon Musk purchased Twitter in late October for $44 billion. In an early reign characterized by chaos both on and off the social media platform, a number of organizations – including but not limited to [6]the British monarchy – have taken the company to court alleging unpaid bills.
[7]Outage-ous: Twitter OKs cannabis ads, then goes up in smoke
[8]Musk says he ain't going anywhere as Twitter CEO until at least late 2023
[9]Salesforce woes continue as Twitter slashes spending with SaaS supermonster
[10]Cat saves 'good bots' from Twitter API purge
One of the standout items in a truly fascinating [11]index of evidence [PDF] filed in support of Canary's claim is titled "Swag Gift box for Elon" (page 40) shipped to Twitter's Market Street headquarters in San Francisco for September 23. Deeper into the document (page 81), we find out what was inside the $6,783.99 treasure trove.
The hoard includes two branded bomber jackets for $1,000, two branded T-shirts for $550, socks somehow coming to $260, a $585 cheese board, $215 of cheese to go with it, [12]Nikka Whisky for $689, a $129.99 rocket cocktail shaker, a moon ice mold for $148, a branded magnetic box at $795, and more.
[13]
Most of these items came with a "set-up" charge ranging from $85 to $125. We dearly hope everyone enjoyed "Elon's party" as it is described in the notes of the invoice despite the thousands of layoffs that followed, layoffs that are starting to make more and more sense if Twitter was this profligate.
If we unpack the invoice that forms the bulk of Canary's complaint (pages 66-74), we find hoodies, T-shirts, socks and stickers ordered in ungodly quantities with absurd packing and shipping costs. Who spends a quarter of a million on branded merchandise? There aren't even enough people left at Twitter to enjoy them.
Have fun browsing through the invoices. We can't dissect them all here, but the amount of tat ordered is staggering, the use of "swag" indiscriminate.
[14]
The company was served the complaint on January 25 with a deadline to respond by February 24. "Twitter represents that it needs several more weeks to investigate the allegations and assess the causes of action asserted against it in the complaint," attorneys said in a filing asking for an extension to March 17. ®
Get our [15]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.canarymarketing.com/
[2] https://regmedia.co.uk/2023/02/21/twittercanarylawsuit.pdf
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2Y-T4slxirC4PTf7jx136uQAAAVc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Y-T4slxirC4PTf7jx136uQAAAVc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Y-T4slxirC4PTf7jx136uQAAAVc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2023/01/24/monarchy_chasing_twitter_rent/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/16/twitter_okays_cannabis_ads/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/15/musk_twitter_ceo/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/15/salesforce_twitter/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/06/cat_saves_good_twitter_bots/
[11] https://regmedia.co.uk/2023/02/21/twittercanaryinvoices.pdf
[12] https://www.nikka.com/eng/
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Y-T4slxirC4PTf7jx136uQAAAVc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Y-T4slxirC4PTf7jx136uQAAAVc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[15] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: $800 for a cheese board and cheese?
According to Clarkson's Farm, supermarkets pay around £1200 per cow, so you could have the back of one and make your own cheese for $800
Re: $800 for a cheese board and cheese?
Um, that isn't how it works. Everybody knows you plant the whole cow in the ground and harvest the milk. That's why it is called a dairy farm.
Re: $800 for a cheese board and cheese?
That's only for whole milk, skim and 2% use hydroponic cows.
Re: $800 for a cheese board and cheese?
Well, given the range of cheese in a US supermarket vs that found in (for example) a Sainsbury's in the UK, possibly a large chunk of the $800 is the cost of travel to somewhere that sells good quality cheese.... (Yes, I know you can get better cheeses in shops other than Sainsbury's....)
Re: $800 for a cheese board and cheese?
Are there cheeses beyond Cheddar, Stilton, and Stinking Bishop?
Other cheeses?
There's always X-14 cheese, but it's only for the daring...
https://www.jasperfforde.com/specops/cheeseindex.html
Musk is just sharing some of the company culture outside the company. Namely: character limit.
Does Elon live off whisky cocktails and cheese?
The contents of the box suggest this, and it would kind of explain a lot of his erratic behaviour.
Also, the socks suggest he's one of those people who wears them once them throws them away. Some interesting problems there already for his dream of a colony on Mars : the cow farm and distillery will no doubt be considered early essentials, but pity the poor underling that explains to him that an unlimited supply of new socks might be too hard for phase one of the project.
Re: Does Elon live off whisky cocktails and cheese?
pity the poor underling that explains to him that an unlimited supply of new socks might be too hard for phase one of the project.
I expect they'd be told to put a sock in it...
While I don't think it sounds like Elon's management has been a boon for the company, things like this don't exactly paint old twitter in a great light either. Sometimes when someone is so loudly bad at their job you lose sight of all the regular day to day incompetence.
If your unprofitable company has spent 8 figures on swag over the last decade, that looks pretty awful. Still, I know corporate budgets aren't the same scale as personal finance, that money probably would have only bought a couple programmers over the same decade. It still seems like a weird excess, but an extremely silicon valley one.
"The hoard includes two branded bomber jackets for $1,000, two branded T-shirts for $550, socks somehow coming to $260 ... "
That's a perfectly legitimate expense - it does get cold in space.
$800 for a cheese board and cheese?
I would want the whole cow for that kind of money.