Update [2:47 p.m. EST]: Tablet received the following statement from Groupon via email:
We’ve run a number of deals for Holocaust Museums and educational tours of Auschwitz, and this picture exists in our global stock image library to provide potential imagery for those types of offers. Unfortunately, it was also among the options for our self-service deals and the merchant selected it as the image to accompany their offer. We are adjusting our internal controls to prevent this issue in the future.
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Groupon, the popular e-commerce company, made a gigantic flub on Friday. For a brief moment, around 11:30 a.m. EST, the company posted an offer for a “One-Week Technology Camp at Premier Education Consulting” in Little Neck, New York. But: The accompanying image was picture of the wrong kind of camp.
Perhaps posting a photo of the notorious “Arbeit Macht Frei” gate at Auschwitz was a technical error. It remains unclear. Groupon shopper Britt Trevis noticed the error and tweeted at the company, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the ADL, pointing to the “bad marketing.” Premier Education Consulting was certainly not too impressed either, telling amNewYork: “We have a tremendous problem.”
Yup, awkward.
Tablet reached out to Groupon for comment, but the company has not yet replied as of this publishing.
Hannah Vaitsblit is an intern at Tablet.