Typically, when the Internet gangs up on someone, its because they’ve been racist, sexist, they’ve appropriated a culture, robbed a Kardashian, or accidentally insulted Beyonce.
But on Wednesday, the pitchfork-wielding social media hordes had a different kind of win when they forced home decor company West Elm (part of the Williams-Sonoma family) to pull the “worst sofa in history” from its catalog offerings.
Last week, writer Anna Henzel posted a scathing review of “The Peggy,” one of “history’s worst couches,” on The Awl. Henzel, who described her own rant as “deranged,” had months of trouble with the $1200 living room centerpiece, from button popping to cushion shifting, to inscrutable repair kits, to, finally, a complete collapse.
“We would scooch across a cushion at the wrong angle, and a button would pop off, leaving a fraying hole behind,” Hezel wrote. “We would lean back slightly too far, and all of the cushions would shift forward and over the edge of the couch in unison.”
But in her pain, Herzel made a startling discovery: there is an entire community of Peggy-haters was lurking in the dark recesses of the web, and inspired by her article, they mobilized.
By Wednesday at noon, West Elm had removed the Peggy from its website, and links to the couch redirected to West Elm’s front page (they’re having a sale!). By Wednesday afternoon, West Elm was pledging to not just fix the dastardly seating elements, but replace the couches for free—or, in the event they were too far gone, issue a full refund to anyone who could prove their Peggy had fallen apart.
Neither the company itself, nor its parent company, Williams-Sonoma, has released a statement about the sofa’s sudden disappearance. Employees at Heat Street‘s local West Elm said that the Peggy is not currently available, but should be stocked again in a “few weeks” or special ordered.
They would not say why Peggy was not available.