How LOVEFiLM kept their user experience warm in the snow

During the course of last week's winter weather we heard a lot from people about how much the snow was going to cost the UK economy. Some types of enterprise, however, were affected worse than others.

LOVEFiLM's entire business model rather depends on a working postal service, and so they faced potentially a great deal of disruption to their service, and consequently a bad and disappointing end user experience.

They chose to handle it in a really good way.

First of all, when you logged into your account, a custom message apologising for any disruption that you might have experienced. This appeared in the slot that normally reminds you to rate the DVDs you've rented.

"The Snow Must Go On... and so will we. Here's the situation: Royal Mail are struggling to deliver to some parts of the UK, and couldn't reach our warehouse at all Thursday. We have received discs from them Friday, but they may not be able collect from us and send new discs out to you. All of which means there could be delays before your next title arrives. We're very sorry about this, and are working hard to clear the backlog and give our colleagues at Royal Mail all the help we can. Normal service will resume as soon as possible, now that we're up and running (and slippin' and a-slidin' again)."

Secondly, they gave over the first news slot on their homepage to an announcement about the situation, complete with a funny postcard style image of a postman struggling through the snow.

Instead of being worried about whether I would get my DVDs for the weekend, I just had a warm fuzzy brand feeling, like having a nice cup of hot cocoa on a snowy day. What did your brand do during the cold weather to give that feeling to your users?