This Luxury Dublin Hotel Just Banned All Social Media Influencers

A luxury hotel in Dublin, Ireland has banned all social media influencers (gasp), after a YouTuber sent an email… and unintentionally kicked off a whole load of dramahhhhh.

Here’s what happened. Elle Darby, a YouTuber with a v. healthy 87,000 subscribers and 76,000 instagram followers, contacted The White Moose Cafe hotel to ask for free accomodation on her upcoming trip to Dublin.

In return, she said, she would “feature you in my YouTube videos/dedicated Instagram stories/posts to bring traffic to your hotel and recommend others to book up”.

And that’s where it might have ended, were it not for White Moose Cafe owner Paul Stenson taking serious offence to the email, and posting his response on the hotel’s Facebook page - along with a screenshot of Elle’s original message.

“Dear Social Influencer (I know your name but apparently it’s not important to use names),” he wrote.

“Thank you for your email looking for free accommodation in return for exposure. It takes a lot of balls to send an email like that, if not much self-respect and dignity.

“If I let you stay here in return for a feature in a video, who is going to pay the staff who look after you? Who is going to pay the housekeepers who clean your room?

“The waiters who serve you breakfast? The receptionist who checks you in? Who is going to pay for the light and heat you use during your stay?

He adds: “In future, I’d advise you to offer to pay your way like everyone else, and if the hotel in question believes your coverage will help them, maybe they’ll give you a complimentary upgrade to a suite. This would show more self-respect on your part and, let’s face it, it would be less embarrassing for you.”

Oh, and he ended with this savage sign-off: “P.S. The answer is no.”

Social media users were quick to attack Elle (who’s contact info is still clear to see, despite a half-hearted attempt to black it out), branding her a ‘disgusting freeloader’.

The backlash prompted Elle to record her own response, in a video titled ‘I was exposed (SO embarrassing), in which she breaks down as she explains that she had nothing but the ‘purest intentions’.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8zElbN2_hg

“As a 22-year-old girl, who’s running her own business from her home, I don’t feel like I did anything wrong,” she says, clearly emotional.

The video saw the response start to swing the other way - with people having a go at Paul for publicly shaming Elle online.

How did he react to that? By banning all bloggers.

“Following the backlash received after asking an unidentified blogger to pay for a hotel room, I have taken the decision to ban all bloggers from our hotel and cafe,” Paul wrote.

“The sense of entitlement is just too strong in the blogging community and the nastiness, hissy fits and general hate displayed after one of your members was not granted her request for a freebie is giving your whole industry a bad name. ”

WELL THEN. Did you keep up with all of that? Thoughts?

By Lizzie Cox