Woman 'humiliated' by hotel owner's rant

Blogger Elle Darby was criticised for asking a hotel for a freebie. Photo / YouTube

We all love a good freebie, but this social media influencer picked the wrong hotel owner to try her luck with.

Elle Darby, who has more than 80,000 followers on YouTube, approached Dublin hotel owner Paul Stenson asking for a complimentary stay in return for some coverage on her YouTube and Instagram pages, news.com.au reports.

But Mr Stenson, owner of Dublin's White Moose Café and Charleville Lodge, responded in a way she had never expected. Taking to his company's Facebook page, he wrote a scathing response that quickly went viral.

Dear Social Influencer (I know your name but apparently it’s not important to use names), Thank you for your email...

Posted by The White Moose Café on Tuesday, 16 January 2018

"Thank you for your email looking for free accommodation in return for exposure," he wrote. "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 your video, who is going to pay the staff who look after you? ... Lucky for us, we too have a significant social media following."

While he didn't directly identify the blogger in the Facebook post, there were some clues that led to people figuring out it was in fact Ms Darby. The shocked woman later came out in a 13-minute long YouTube rant complaining about the treatment she received from Mr Stenson, detailing her shock at being inundated with critical messages from strangers.

"I was embarrassed, I felt humiliated," Darby, 22, said in the opening part of the video.
Mr Stenson has since apologised to all bloggers in a tongue-in-cheek post.

**OFFICIAL APOLOGY TO BLOGGERS** Dear bloggers, Following the incident today in which one of your members was clearly...

Posted by The White Moose Café on Tuesday, 16 January 2018

Clearly loving the attention, he followed up with a post banning all bloggers.

**ALL BLOGGERS BANNED FROM OUR BUSINESS** Following the backlash received after asking an unidentified blogger to pay...

Posted by The White Moose Café on Wednesday, 17 January 2018

And finally, he thanked them for the publicity, writing: "I'd just like to say a huge thanks to all the bloggers for their hard work over the past two days. The publicity you've given us is absolutely priceless."