10 most embarrassing Twitter blunders

Social enterprise

10 most embarrassing Twitter blunders

By Erin Carson April 7, 2014, 10:16 AM PDT

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We’ve all seen tweets that inspire the question, “Did they really just post that?” The answer, embarrassingly, is ‘Yes’ for these 10 train wrecks.

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Justine Sacco

As a PR executive, Justine Sacco probably should have known better, but she tweeted a very off-color racial joke — that went viral — and then hopped on a long international flight to South Africa. When she landed, she was in the middle of one of the biggest social media firestorms of 2013.

Epicurious

Epicurious had to learn the hard way that in the midst of death and destruction, no one wants to hear about breakfast recipes. They apologized for their “insensitivity” (their words) shortly after.

Home Depot

A cringe-worthy photo of a monkey and two black men, attached to a College GameDay tweet in 2013 sent Home Depot into damage control mode. The company later posted that they terminated the agency and individual responsible.

SpaghettiOs

Even after 72 years, it’s a good policy to assume that it’ll always be “too soon” when it comes to pairing a smiling cartoon piece of pasta with a national tragedy.

KitchenAid

During a 2012 presidential debate, a KitchenAid employee mistakenly tweeted a bad, politically-slanted joke about President Barack Obama’s dead grandmother, from the company’s account instead of their own. It took eight minutes for KitchenAid to issue an apology and explanation for the tweet.

Kmart

Kmart was doing fine until the brand decided to tack on a self-promoting hashtag to the end of a tweet expressing condolences for the Newton, Connecticut shooting.

CelebBoutique

CelebBoutique’s obliviousness to the Aurora, Colorado movie theater shooting of 2012 proves the value of listening to what others are saying on Twitter.

American Red Cross

Another case of tweeting from the wrong account u2013u2013 this time, an alcohol-related joke intended for a personal account u2013u2013 had the American Red Cross explaining that they were, indeed, sober. The brand recovered, in part from some good humor. Dogfish Head beer responded, encouraging followers to donate money using #gettinslizzerd.

By Erin Carson

Erin Carson is a Staff Reporter for CNET and a former Multimedia Editor for TechRepublic.

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