His stores are suffering customers are deserting him, now Gerry Harvey the Chairman of Harvey Norman has faced the embarrassment of a customer failing to show up at a publicity stunt in one of his stores for the handing over of the first 84″ LG Ultra Definition TV sold in Australia.
Late yesterday media were invited to what was billed as Harvey Norman executive Chairman, Gerry Harvey, personally making the first sale at his store in Caringbah; they said that he would be there to congratulate the first Australian customer to purchase an Ultra HD TV.
The media turned up the red carpet was laid out but no Gerry Harvey, even senior LG management made it to the event which quickly turned into a PR fiasco.
It now turns out that Harvey Norman management knew earlier in the day that the customer who is a local business executive was not going to turn up, Gerry Harvey was told but not the LG management who turned up for the event.
Philip Anderson the newly appointed head of LG Communications said he had “I have no idea why no one had turned up Harvey Norman management have not told me why the event was cancelled.”
Even Ben Maddison the franchisee of the Harvey Norman Caringbah store where the event was taking place failed to turn up for the event, he also failed to tell LG management attending the event that it was cancelled.
One irate journalist who drove for more than an hour to attend the function said “What else do you expect from Harvey Norman management, no wonder customers are walking away from shopping in their stores”.
Michael Doyle the sales director at LG Australia said that Harvey Norman had “basically forgotten to tell them” that the client was a no show and the event cancelled.
