Dublin hotel and café ban 'all bloggers' after uproar over email from UK influencer

In case you missed it, a Dublin hotel was approached by a vlogger who offered to feature the business on YouTube and social media in return for a free stay.

Dublin hotel and café ban 'all bloggers' after uproar over email from UK influencer

In case you missed it, a Dublin hotel was approached by a vlogger who offered to feature the business on YouTube and social media in return for a free stay.

The manager of the Charleville Lodge Hotel was not impressed and shared her email to the White Moose Café’s Facebook page, a sister business, blurring out the vlogger’s name.

"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," wrote Paul Stenson in a lengthy rebuttal.

He told the influencer to"offer to pay your way like everyone else" in future.

A few hours later, UK vlogger Elle Darby revealed she was the influencer who reached out to the hotel.

She discussed her embarrassment in a video titled ’i was exposed (SO embarrassing)’ on her YouTube channel, which has been viewed in excess of 135,000 times.

"I feel disgusting having to say this. As a 22-year-old girl, who’s running her own business from her home, I don’t feel like I did anything wrong," Darby says, pointing out that it is common practice for influencers with a high number of followers to reach out to collaborate with businesses such as hotels.

She said she had been subject to online bullying by trolls she described as "these were all 30 years plus people internet bullying a 22-year-old girl who is just trying to run her own business and raise awareness of what appeared to be a stunning Dublin hotel."

Darby said she was embarrassed and upset by the experience and said blogging has to be respected as the industry it is.

"The sooner the blogging industry is realised as a proper industry the better."

The situation received a lot of attention in the blogging community, with many calling out Stenson and the hotel for their response.

Stenson responded by banning all bloggers from the premises.

"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.

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."

He said Darby’s video response was in keeping with bloggers’ "general modus operandi".

"This kind of victimization is very prevalent in the blogging industry, and is in keeping with their general modus operandi of wanting everything for nothing," he said.

"If any of you attempt to enter our premises from now on, you will be ejected."

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