A residence used to house influencers during the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival by the fashion app Dote grouped white influencers together and gave them better rooms, according to a group of YouTubers who were part of the experience.
Buzzfeed details the claims with YouTuber Daniella Perkins hinting at segregated bedrooms in a video from the house titled “The Truth About Coachella Ft. Mental Breakdown.” Perkins claims in the video that white influencers were put on a different side of the house than everyone else.
Perkins tells the camera in between tears in the video that she “just feel[s] so awkward” and “so uncomfortable” being in the influencer house.
Keisha Shadè Akinyemi, who goes by ItzKeisha on YouTube, said in her own video that white influencers were given beds, while women of color slept on pull-out couches at the residence.
Other guests of the house say that Dote put white influencers together in photos and left guests of color out of some photo shoots.
Dote released a statement on Instagram following the accusations:
“‘We’re devastated to hear that girls on one of our trips felt that they were treated differently because of their race. I want to make sure you all know that we did not — and would never — intentionally group girls together based on any racial characteristics,’” founder Lauren Farleigh wrote.
Farleigh vowed that the company is “committed to doing better” and is in the “‘process of gathering all of the details of what happened so we can create an action plan to make sure it doesn’t happen ever again.’”
