Eat at Jumbo's joins lawsuit against Yelp

[ron_newman]

Today's Globe g section has a long feature article about online restaurant-review sites. It includes a full-page photo of Grover Taylor, the owner of Eat at Jumbo's in Ball Square. He's suing Yelp:

Grover Taylor, owner of Eat at Jumbo’s in Somerville, says his ratings dropped sharply last year when he declined to advertise on the site. “They called every week, telling me I needed to pay $500 a month to advertise. When I said no, a lot of one-star reviews started appearing on top. And then the phone would ring. Hi, this is Art from Yelp. We can make them disappear.’’ Taylor says the calls slowed and changed tone when he told the Yelp agent he was joining the class action suit. “Art stopped calling. A new guy from Yelp is calling now.’’

(For those interested, here is Eat at Jumbo's Yelp page)

Comments

[sunshineyellow.livejournal.com]

I have personally experienced Eat at Jumbo's bad/extremely slow service and have written more than a few 1 star Yelp reviews in my time. Some places just suck and they can't blame Yelp for that. I do think Yelp might be using some sleazy and unethical tactics, but I don't believe that they write the 1 star reviews, just target those businesses who aren't doing so well for their shakedowns. Just as terrible, but I'm not crying for the businesses either.

[prunesnprisms.livejournal.com]

Me too, I had a couple nasty experiences with them and don't feel like going back. I think I probably posted about it on Yelp. they were real.

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

I do think Yelp might be using some sleazy and unethical tactics, but I don't believe that they write the 1 star reviews, just target those businesses who aren't doing so well for their shakedowns.

I don't know whether or not Yelp writes 1-star reviews, but I am pretty convinced by the allegations that Yelp removes positive reviews of some businesses (because it has happened to some positive reviews I have written, which were up for years in some cases and then suddenly vanished along with a lot of the other positive reviews of the same business).

I appreciate your feedback about bad experiences at EAJ, though.

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

And the businesses for which my positive reviews were removed were (and are) doing fine, happy to say.

[pekmez.livejournal.com]

I think any restaurant will have its one-star and five-star reviews, but you can do a lot to the rating if you delete some of the good reviews, and it's not at all clear that yelp's not doing that.

Even if they aren't messing with the average rating, threatening to make all the bad reviews appear on the first N pages of search results and to rearrange only if you pay to advertise with them is sleazy.

[sparkgrrl658.livejournal.com]

yeah, i mean, the other thing that's important to note about this is, it's more likely someone is going to run to the internet ranting and raving when they've had a terrible experience, rather than a good one, and certainly even more unlikely if everything just went fine.

[yourenotwithme.livejournal.com]

1. I have had two awful experiences with Eat at Jumbo's, one that included forgotten items and a delivery person who invited themselves into my home and had to be asked to leave.

2. I am a Yelp Elite and have yet to see my reviews vanish or get lost along the way. The algorithm will never be made public but you can now access all of the reviews that have been filtered out regardless of whether or not you advertise.

3. One of my friends has a five star review of Eat at Jumbo's that has been a Review of the Day. CLEARLY, this place is hated on Yelp.

4. I have a friend who owns a business that has just about all five star reviews. Why? Because the business is well run all the time. End of story. Sometimes though, people just don't like what you're offering and that's it. Suing won't fix it.