My letter and response to Tempurpedic

[Horse with no Name]

This is my letter:

Your company was recently contacted regarding your sponsorship of the hate and vitriol spewed by Bill O'Reilley who wishes for American's to die. In such style, I can only assume that you hold the same views. It is called "putting your money where your mouth is". Since your money is on Bill O'Reilley, one can only assume he is your mouthpiece.

Since I do not agree with the indiscriminate killing of my fellow citizens, I ALSO will put my money where my mouth is, which won't be in your pockets.

I will disseminate the fact that you support this hatemonger to many sources of internet media as well as message boards.

I will contact all members of my family and all of my friends to boycott your products.

One has to wonder how many of us "putting OUR money where our mouth is" will cause you to change your mind?

No longer in MY America will hate be tolerated to innocent groups of other Americans.

In case you haven't seen the polls lately, more than 57% of OTHER Americans feel the same way as I do.

Why does Tempurpedic HATE San Francisco?

Tempurpedic advertises with Bill O'Rielly.

Tempurpedic supports the hate speech of Bill O'Rielly.



It is refreshing however that Equifax has pulled their advertising from the O'Reilley spin show.

It is nice to see that some businesses actually care about who their mouthpieces are.



Have a nice day.

This is their (canned) response:

Dear xxxxxxx:



Thank you for contacting us about our radio advertisements!



Tempur-Pedic® is an advertiser of the O’Reilly Factor featuring Bill O’Reilly, but we do not in any way endorse the beliefs aired on his show. Tempur-Pedic® advertises on various radio and television programs to communicate to the public about our products and the benefits they provide.



In addition, I have forwarded your email on to the appropriate internal personnel in our Marketing Department for additional review.





Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.

We appreciate your interest in Tempur-Pedic® products!



Roger R.

Customer Service Representative

800-821-6621 Toll Free

www.tempurpedic.com

Edited for typo

[annabanana]

1. Well at least they were "forwarding your email"

I got pretty much the same response, but without that little concession. I count that as some progress.

[Horse with no Name]

6. I thought it was different

We have to keep hitting them.
Maybe they will start crying "Uncle" before it is all over.

[goddess40]

2. good letter - thanks

They may seem to be sloughing it off but if they get many of these letters it may sink in.

[marylanddem]

3. Excellent letter - way to go! nt

[lovelaureng]

4. Good letter,

perhaps it will be the start of a movement against dillhole O'Reilly.

[Seansky]

5. yeah, we all got the standard mass response you got, and the one

from equifax removing the sponsorship...Guess T gave the entire staff a script to send to every complainer...

[acmejack]

9. They're all from Roger R

nt

[AntiCoup2K4]

17. The "R" probably stands for "Robot"

Database-generated merge letter, probably.

[Ian David]

7. Let's DU Tempurpedic's online product reviews, starting at Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/103-1335230-5936616

[Mr_Spock]

13. Friggin Amazon has "copy-cat" mattresses that come up under "tempurpedic"

:eyes:

[ThoughtCriminal]

8. I don't care how comfortable the freaking mattress is

I couldn't sleep at night if I supported that neo-fascist lunatic.

[Maraya1969]

10. I'm tired of writting letters. So here is mine:

Just wanted to let you know regarding Bill O'Reilly. You are now on my shit list also. And I have a big mouth and a big family and a lot of friends.


Sincerely,

XXXXXXXXXX

[EFerrari]

27. lol!

Simple and direct! :)

[Journeyman]

11. It doesn't surprise me a corporation would send a form letter. . .

in response to criticism of their endorsement of a controversial situation.

Despite the form nature of their response, however, I imagine within the corporation there is a great deal of debate about where their advertising dollars are being spent. Above all, most retailers shy away from controversy, so the backlash against O'Reilly -- though slow in coming -- may yet materialize. For the moment, though, their use of a form letter is only another indication of their reticence to be put in the glare of a public spotlight.

Of course, Tempur-Pedic may be owned by a rabid O'Reilly fan, in which case no amount of letters will sway them.

But for now, good letter. . . I hope it and all the others that have been sent succeed in getting O'Reilly removed (or at the least, publicly spanked for being an idiot).

[LTR]

15. That is, if Swedes listen to O' Really

Tempur-Pedic is a Swedish company. And they advertise all over talk radio, including AAR.

The form letter response is common. It was lawyer approved and is designed for CYA purposes.

However, if sponsors get a ton of these, it could most certainly sway their opinion on where to advertise.

[serryjw]

12. I won't support any company that advertises on hate radio...

Thanks for sending. We need a place that we can all post and track who these advertisers are.

[indepat]

18. And I was, that's was, considering buying one of their mattresses: not any

more.

[serryjw]

19. Where do you live?

There are other companies that have similar products, half the price.

[indepat]

21. In the state that has the honor and glory of claiming the senate majority

leader as its own: I personally don't like his politics, his conflicts of interest, his seeming insider trading, and his treatment of cats.

[serryjw]

22. Do you have an American Warehouse there?

They advertise something very similar

[indepat]

24. Don't know but I'll check it out

[troubleinwinter]

14. I also got their 'canned' response....

A friend of mine works in marketing for a large corp. She says that the original emails are generally ignored, and get the 'canned answer'. BUTTTTT, a response to the canned answer is generally READ.

The response you got DID have the note ("In addition, I have forwarded your email on to the appropriate internal personnel in our Marketing Department for additional review.") that your mail would be forwarded, so perhaps they are starting to notice!

Following is correspondence with Tempur-Pedic (email order is ass-backwards, of course... top is the recent response from me, the one my friend says might be READ!)

Note: The BS about considering buying their product in near future is actually truthful!

...........................................

JoLinda~

While I understand that ordinarily, your company would not "endorse the beliefs aired on the show", but we are at war. Your company is sponsoring a radio program that advocates a terrorist attack upon our country and people, with Bill O'Reilly's statement:

"And if Al Qaeda comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it. We're going to say, look, every other place in America is off limits to you , except San Francisco. You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead."

I expect Tempur-Pedic to act responsibly to reject the support and sponsorship of such a murderous and treasonous call for terrorism.

It happens that I am moving to a new home in less than two months, and had decided to purchase a Tempur-Pedic system. As a matter of conscience, I will not be able to support your company with my purchase, as long as Tempur-Pedic sponsors 'The O'Reilly Factor' calling for terrorism upon American people.

Mxxxxxxxxxxxxx


----- Original Message -----
From: Marketing
To: Mxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Tuesday, November 15, 2005 11:02 AM
Subject: RE: The O'Reilly Factor

Thank you for contacting us about our radio advertisements!

Tempur-Pedic® is an advertiser of the O’Reilly Factor featuring Bill O’Reilly, but we do not in any way endorse the beliefs aired on the show. Tempur-Pedic® advertises on various radio and television programs to communicate to the public about our products and the benefits they provide.

Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.

We appreciate your interest in Tempur-Pedic® products!

JoLinda Rowe

Marketing Administrator

--------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Mxxxxxx
Sent: Sunday, November 13, 2005 1:03 PM
To: Marketing
Subject: The O'Reilly Factor

On the November 9th broadcast of the "O'Reilly Factor" program, which your company sponsors, Mr. O'Reilly encouraged a terrorist attack on an American city and populace with these statements:

"And if Al Qaeda comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it. We're going to say, look, every other place in America is off limits to you , except San Francisco. You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead."

Attempting to incite such an attack is dangerous and offensive. Followers of Bill O’ Reilly may commit such violence. This broadcast in the very least is horribly offensive and may incite violence and terrorism against American citizens.

I would expect that your company will show that it does not support calls for terrorism against Americans by withdrawing your sponsorship of his programs.

Mxxxxxxxxxx

[greiner3]

16. money does talk

Their stock price has done pretty crappy since they had an Initial Price Offering (IPO) not too long ago. Class does show!

[KharmaTrain]

20. Why Not Call Them And Say Hello???

Don't they have an 800 number...the call's on their dime, no?

Even better...I'm sure they'd love to hear from 10 or 20 DUers plugging up their phone lines instead of selling cheap mattresses to couch potatoes.

:rofl:

[zanne]

23. I almost bought one of their mattresses, and I told them so.

I just wrote them. I'll stick with my old lumpy mattress; I'll still sleep better at night.

[calimary]

25. Excellent! They need to get a whole bunch of these.

The more people distance themselves from him, the more - pardon the pun - radioactive he becomes, and more of a headache than a help to whatever broadcasting outlets carry him. When you become more of a problem, especially a PR problem, and you start making the company look bad (assuming, unlike Pox "news," that company actually cares about its image beyond just a small but disproportionately loud fringe reactionary butthead contingent), you start inviting that company to entertain a lot of second thoughts about their involvement with such a talent. If there's any doubt, two words: Kate Moss.

[Deja Q]

26. If they don't endorse his beliefs, why do they buy the airtime?

Surely morals mean more than money?

Or do they want O'really's viewrship to think that Tempurpedic supports O'really?

:shrug: