"THEY" lurk here.....

It is bc I grew up in a southern Baptist church and saw a lot of bullsh*t growing up.  Acceptance and love wasn't always our congregation's strong point, unfortunately, so it really bugs me to see "Christians" of the TC type using God's name for their own selfish agendas.

kiwikate not really except it's owned by Christine and she has a few people working for her. The only one I've dealt with is Mary Kay.

Or maybe they were just replying in kind to your attitude.

I can't participate in the TC thread.  It just smacks too much of mean girls picking on another girl.  Regardless if TC deserves it or not.

Realize that CD probably had a contract with TC for 6 months to a year before the first thread here was started.  Of course they are trying to protect their investment--they probably have a ton of money tied with in their contract with TC.  I can see not buying any TC products, but I'm not sure that it's fair to vilify CD for honoring their contract and selling product that was already manufactured.

But in response to the title, it doesn't surprise me in the least that scrap companies search the internet for mention of their company.  It seems smart, to me.

Basket1lady
I'll reply to you because I do think it needs to get done.  There are other people reading here, some of who aren't aware of the entire situation and who might benefit in following the bread crumbs to understand better why there's a heavy Tracie Claiborne watch on this board. It could be you're in the know regarding everything I'm about to say. If that is the case, feel free to ignore the following paragraphs and consider them public knowledge for anyone else who stumbles in here.

1. Tracie got herself in hot waters on here last year when she publicly decided to mount her "moral" horse and crusade against those who were raising an eyebrow in Becky Higgins' direction for the frankly appalling publicity campaign surrounding her new HOME by BH line products, those stonewrap papers. At no point was anything particularly mean said about BH. We just wondered who the heck approved the video and what they were thinking. It didn't look professional or particularly on point at all. Tracie threw herself in the conversation, poo-poo-ing us for daring to criticise BH. Important to note here that nobody went had a hate-on for BH but an overall WTF was expressed, that's it. She kept coming back, picking and pretending to be the bigger person.
2. Which led to some voicing very sound and logical remarks regarding Tracie's general public attitude towards big companies in the SB world. The example of her private video shooting down WRMK's typewriter for her acolytes but then publicly sweet-talking (and frankly, buttocks-kissing) the brand to either gain more free stuff (like the typewriter if I'm not mistaken) and/or worm her way further into the "inner circle" of today's major SB players. The problem was not that she praised and continues to praise all the big names in the industry in public, rather that she was more than happy to bash them in private. Whomever dared to release the link to her private video bashing WRMK's typewriter was put on Tracie's personal witch-hunt list. You see, somebody in her group had the guts to let outsiders know she had secretly made a negative review and posted it to her followers.
3. Witch-hunting is Tracie's go-to pastime in moderating her group. She employs methods such as Googling the names of members (and possibly ex-members she has banned but more on the banning later) and following them on other platforms to try and find dirt on them. You see, Tracie loves a public shaming. And when she does one, she goes all out. Lengthy posts on social media/her FB group which she ultimately deletes to erase any traces of her lashing out at someone. One of her latest victims just a few weeks back was someone who "dared" to say something along the lines of (paraphrasing here): "Do we really need to listen to all this (some other member was going on about personal problems with Tracie's blessing) when this is a craft group?" Banned by Tracie straight away with a 5-course meal of a public shaming which included Tracie mentioning her full real name. Yeah, that's the kind of attitude we're super reeled up about.
4. Because, in the end, hypocrisy is Tracie's trademark. She will publicly pretend to support any major (and minor these days) SB player to try and gain their free product by being added to their PR list or affection (and presence on one of her podcasts). And then she'll happily bash those same companies in private but get really pissed off and go on a must-ban-the-one-who-released-this-info hunt, employing vigorous methods to meet her ends and try to expose the "rebel" (which is a typical dictatorship method). It's the two-facedness of Tracie that got a lot of us riled up and put her on our collective watchlist.
5. Turns out that keeping an eye on her paid off. Or, I should say, paid Tracie handsomely. I don't even know how to summarise her Paypal donation scam. She used the following she built (and rules over with an iron fist, banning and publicly shaming at her own will, reinterpreting the rules as she wishes, leaving behind a trail of terror) to play out a very questionable story about her pacemaker replacement. Nothing really made sense. We've discussed this at length on NSBR and we've had people who have worked in hospitals, dealt with this type of situation come in to confirm our suspicions. The way she spun the story simply could not have happened. But it was the way the story needed to be told to illicit sympathy and a need to financially contribute to her cause. Long story short, Tracie emerges from the surgery fine and all with the hospital having allegedly wiped her bill clean because she explained to them that her followers had been generous to her so the hospital followed suit? Again, this whole story reeks of twisting the truth. Anyway, at no point does she offer the money back that her donators deposited STRAIGHT INTO HER HUSBAND'S PAYPAL ACCOUNT (no traces left for IRS since donations made through GoFundMe and other crowdfunding websites are taxable). However, her life suddenly improves. Her husband finally gets her the mobile phone plan with unlimited Internet access, there's a Disneyland trip, another trip, a new purse which she felt she "deserved", etc. Needless to say, our watchdog ears were burning. All this info was revealed by Tracie herself on social media. Tracie's own downfall is her big mouth.
6. And we've kept tabs ever since. She has eaten very unhealthily for someone recovering from heart surgery (on multiple occasions, including her very first proper meal since getting her surgery). She has spun yet another story about the donations she got. She has pretended God miraculously made her pacemaker settle in the right place just the day before going in for an alleged other surgery (although just before she mentions the nurse would get her an appointment with the "heart doctor" in late August, not at all in early July as Tracie then pretends: it never makes any sense). We're looking at a spin doctor who has scammed her followers out of money for supposedly a life-threatening procedure when it wasn't the case, pretending she was delaying said surgery because of lack of funds (when it more than likely was all planned out and going according to plan), asking for money although the pacemaker was donated and the hospitaled waived her medical bill (she has herself admitted since that the donations will get used when she gets to her stack of bills: we'd been speculating all along that she was hustling to get money to pay off older bills, not the planned-out and definitely not unexpected pacemaker replacement surgery).
7. This whole affair has turned us into watch dogs with a clear objective: making sure that anyone can trace Tracie back to these threads and figure out something's wrong. If we come across as bitchy in the process, so be it. But she crossed a line I cannot accept or forgive with the medical scam. And just to make it clear: the person who brought up the demand for donations straight to Tracie's husband Paypal account on NSBR was not a previous participant in the already-established Tracie Claiborne watch threads. It was a follower of Tracie who felt uneasy about the situation and decided to anonymously post about it, asking what others would do in her place. We immediately knew she meant Tracie. But we hadn't even brought that situation up yet. People are becoming wary. And this should be a place for open, honest discussion, even if it doesn't feel really nice at times. We shouldn't go about such consequential subjects and frankly immoral people taking advantage of others in a "be kind to each other" way. We're pissed off Tracie has done this to people, the witch-hunting, banning for no exact purpose, public shaming with their full names exposed, pretending to be a sweet nice follower of Christ when it's so easy to see she's as two-faced and hypocritical as it gets and, as a final nail in her own coffin, scamming her own followers. I'm appalled by the whole situation. I'm appalled that Tracie's allowed to go on her merry way and spin tales about how we're just  out on a personal vendetta against her for no reason. That is anything but the case. And if us being so freakin' vocal about it just prevents her ever scamming her followers again, that's enough for me. Ideally, this (and all the evidence we've gathered in these threads, including many screenshots of Tracie's doing and saying online) ought to stop her in her ascend to a higher place in the SB "celebrity" world. But it doesn't look that way for now. She still keeps landing guest design jobs and podcast guests. So, we keep on going, we continue, we don't give up and we don't go quiet.
8. Tracie is of course not banned from this board. We don't have any banning powers nor would we have employed them if we did. She stopped intervening after being called out on her bull$h*t. As a matter of fact, her profile is still active on this forum. We don't ban or demand she be banned. We're not like Tracie. That's the whole point of us exposing her: her methods and going about her business (after all, she is working on her name as a brand) are despicable. We'd be more than happy if she participated again and would love to see which umpteenth story she'd spin to try and explain herself (and her scammy actions) away. Of course she won't return to do that. She'd just land herself in more hot waters she couldn't save herself from (because you can't clean a dodgy story when you're faced with a bunch of people who aren't willing to "just" believe you but use logics, skepticism and evidence-based reasoning). We're not banning any companies either. How the freakity frack would we do that (and why)? We're just establishing a list of companies and people still associating with her, allowing for people who do not wish to support Tracie in any way (especially after the medical scam which she directly benefited from financially) to actively stay away and boycott those companies. After all, we're the ones pouring our cash into this hobby. We're the ones allowing it to survive and even thrive. We have that power. And some of us wish to use it for a greater good. That's all, folks!

The scrap/craft community is an incestuous, social media driven business. It's female dominated and full of drama. That's nothing new. To be successful you need to carefully navigate treacherous waters and your online reputation can make or break your profits.

I don't think Cocoa Daisy or MSP or Ali Edwards or Kelly Purkey have to roll over and cut people off to appease public opinion. However, handling your message professionally will go a long way toward not losing you customers and sales and may even gain you new customers who appreciate you treating your business like a business and not a high school clique.

I honestly get why you would feel that way. I get what Basket1lady is saying too. But this is a scrapbook related board and as such we discuss the industry good, bad and indifferent. Tracie Claiborne is currently involved in the negative side of the industry. Many of the reasons have been stated. All of us, as always and with anything, get to choose where we spend our money. We are the customers. Many of us do not wish to spend our money with someone who has scammed, lied, shamed and self proclaimed. Then there are some of us don't care or don't see it that way, like you.

The thing about any message board is that we can all choose to read, comment, like, scroll by, whatever we want. I don't mind you posting that you don't agree - that's fine with me. We are letting companies who care know that we are not spending our money on them if they are supporting and/or endorsing Tracie at this time. And we are glad that companies are interested in our free market research. But once they know, it's on them to prove they want our business. You know, as Maya Angelou said, "When you know better, you do better."

I don't mind a hand slap or being compared to a teenage girl. Hell at age 60 that's a huge compliment and I'll take it! But as we are unlikely to turn your opinion so too you are unlikely to turn ours. Only Tracie herself can do that, and she is welcome to come back and do so anytime at all.

Damn,girl! Gets me everytime!

I need to handslap the hand slapper (not you myboysnme) BUT fifth grade girls are generally ten going on eleven and in my opinion some of the sweetest people on earth.  Having taught that grade level for 26 years, I know fifth grade girls.  Now there are a few who are full of drama, but overall they are just darling.  I would say that seventh grade and up is more accurate for the drama filled comparison.  Please carry on with all name calling.