Jul 24, 2008 6:41 pm US/Eastern
Hundreds Of Yellow Books 'Dumped' In Hollywood
HOLLYWOOD (CBS4) ―
Some businesses say the Yellow Book has some explaining to do after hundreds of advertising based phone directories were found in a Hollywood dumpster.
Attorney Bill Kennedy, whose law firm paid a hefty fee to have the front cover ad, was furious after he found out nearly 200 Yellow Books, still shrink wrapped in packs of ten, in a dumpster in the 6400 block of Stirling Road.
"These people are delivering these things, supposedly to people's home and businesses," said Kennedy. "But instead of delivering them, they're throwing them in dumpsters. This is absurd. I've never seen anything like this."
The books found in the dumpster were destined for customers in Parkland, Coral Springs, Tamarac and Margate.
Kennedy said his law firm has spent more than $150-thousand in ads with the Yellow Book since 2006. He wondered how many others know about the 'dumped' directories.
"What about this guy," wondered Kennedy as he flipped through a Yellow Book retrieved from the dumpster. "He doesn't know anything about this. These are hard working people in this book."
"This was the first time we decided to go with the Yellow Book," said Lucy Manzerolle. "This is where our money went."
Manzerolle, who works for "A Customer First" Air Conditioning, said they spent $988 a month for the Yellow Book ads. In a strange twist of fate, the company parks it's truck overnight right next to the dumpster where the books were found.
"When you look at it, there is probably a couple of hundred in there, in this one dumpster in Broward County. I'm not going to spend time to run from dumpster to dumpster," said Manzerolle.
That's what has some advertisers like Kennedy and Manzerolle concerned, if the books were dumped in Hollywood, could it be happening in other places.
In response to inquiries about the dumped books, Yellow Book released a statement which said, in part, "We've used a well planned and orchestrated distribution process. The situation appears to be an isolated incident."
But it may not be an isolated incident after all.
Paul Chu, who works for "A Customer First" Air Conditioning service said he's seen this before.
"I've seen this numerous times," said Chu. "This is more than once that this has happened here, in this same dumpster."
Yellow Book says an investigation is underway.
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