The online outrage around the collapse of BHS

April 29 2016

By @G_Parsons33

Published in Crisis

British Home Stores has been hitting the headlines this week after it declared on Monday that it would be going into administration.

The iconic department store chain’s predicament has put thousands of jobs on the line and revealed some very unethical business practices by the company’s shareholders. We used the Visibrain media monitoring platform to study what’s being said about the brands situation online.

The public reacts to the decline of an iconic brand

BHS has been on high streets across the UK for generations. Although the stores have been struggling for years, the possibility of its disappearance was always going to attract attention.

BHS was mentioned 99,256 times between Monday 25th and Wednesday 27th April:

An overview of mention volumes around bhs

Thousands took to Twitter to share the news, with many commenting on the department store’s failure to move with the times being the reason for its decline:

Others chose to voice their support to the thousands of BHS staff with their jobs on the line:

However, if we look at the expressions most commonly associated with BHS this week, we can see that the job losses were not the most discussed subject. Instead, BHS’ previous owner, Sir Philip Green, stands out as one of the most reoccurring topics:

The most common expressions associated with BHS

With thousands of mentions, Philip Green is at the centre of the debate around BHS. Public concern around the plight of BHS and its staff has means that his past business transactions have been put under the microscope.

Philip Green targeted by the press

The backlash around Sir Philip Green has been huge. Although he is no longer the owner of BHS, having sold it to businessman Dominic Chappell, he has been accused of making transactions that have left the company teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. The retail tycoon allegedly siphoned millions from BHS (all while the company pension fund was slipping into the red), and gifted the money to his wife in order to avoid taxes. It was also discovered that he has recently purchased a multi-million pound yacht. Whether the boat was bought with BHS money or not, the purchase was at best an insensitive choice to make at a time when thousands could be about to lose their jobs.

Green features in just under a third of all online mentions around BHS since the beginning of the week, appearing 28,424 times. For the sake of comparison, BHS’s current owner, Dominic Chappell, was only mentioned 1,582 times.

Green has also been heavily targeted by the press. BHS’ financial woes have been covered in 10,091 different press articles, news videos and blog posts since Monday. Out of the top 4 most-shared press articles about BHS from the Daily Mail, the Mirror, the BBC and The Guardian, 3 of them focus on Philip Green:

The most shared press articles about BHS

True or not, the allegations against Phillip Green are serious, and it didn’t take long for the scandal to spread into social media.

Green faces backlash on social media

The main hashtags associated with Sir Philip Green give us a good idea of the general sentiment around the business tycoon:

Hashtags associated with Phillip Green

A lot of negative hashtags such a #cronycapitalism, #greed, #taxdodger and #spivvery stand out. The hashtags show that Green’s case has even been linked to the recent Panama Papers scandal: #panamapapers was used hundreds of times.

Many took to Twitter to speak out against Green:

The public outrage continues, and there have been calls to strip him of his knighthood and force him to compensate the failing pension fund.

Phillip Green has undoubtably been the main focus of conversations around BHS this week, with talk of his actions almost eclipsing the news of the department store’s closure and the thousands of job losses involved.

It was announced that Green is due to be questioned about his past activities. Although it is doubtful he will be prosecuted, this affair has left a stain on his reputation.

Subscribe to the newsletter

Stay up to date by subscribing to our newsletter and receive media monitoring best practices, social data trends & exclusive case studies:

This field is not valid
Subscribe

Thank you! We will contact you shortly.

Published in Crisis