Tech accessory firm offers $10,000 apology to customer after crass online persona cracks racist joke
DBrand, a Canadian tech accessory brand, mocked a customer's last name yesterday in a racially charged tweet.
The company received an onslaught of backlash and criticism for the tweet, and then it apologized and offered the man $10,000, which prompted even more outrage.
In an April 8 tweet about a DBrand product that tagged the company, Bhuwan Chitransh wrote that a computer skin he'd bought from DBrand two months prior had changed color.
"What should I do? #DBrandComplaint," Chitransh tweeted.
That same day, DBrand's support bot responded and suggested Chitransh clean the product with a microfiber cloth.
But the next day, DBrand responded to Chitransh's tweet by posting that his last name resembles the words "shit" and "rash."
"Your last name is basically shit rash," the brand wrote in a now-deleted tweet. "Be serious."
DBrand, which sells Hypebeast-syle iPhone covers, is notorious for being rude to its customers on X, but many thought its comment about Chitransh's last name was too far, finding it racist.
"It is shameful to see a skins and phone accessories company like dbrand openly making discriminatory and offensive remarks toward a customer who expressed dissatisfaction with their product on Twitter," an X user tweeted.
Another user shared that he emailed DBrand's CEO to say that its tweet was unprofessional and racist.
"I've emailed the CEO of dbrand regarding the recent post made on their account. Let's see if they take any action," they tweeted alongside a screenshot of their email. "I request you to mail them too, because it’s highly unprofessional and racist to post something like that."
And DBrand did take action. Yesterday, the brand tweeted that its controversial tweet was a "huge fumble," said it apologized to Chitransh, and offered him thousands of dollars.
"We apologized to him directly and offered him $10,000 as a gesture of goodwill," DBrand tweeted. "We've been poking fun at customers on social media for over a decade now. We're not going to stop, but maybe next time you'll be the one who gets $10,000."
While some took the brand's final point literally—many users responded to DBrand's tweet asking the company to make fun of them and pay them—others felt the situation wasn't handled well by the brand.
"Poking fun at customers and being racist are two completely different things," an X user replied to DBrand's apology tweet. "Seems like the going price of being racist is $10,000."
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