PG&E put frontline workers on camera reading real customer complaints

PG&E serves 16 million customers in North and Central California and is working to rebuild trust by enhancing safety, improving reliability and stabilising rates, under CEO Patti Poppe's 'leading with love' turnaround philosophy — while knowing many customers doubt the change is real.

After initial spots showing executives in face-to-face customer conversations earlier in 2025, the Open Lines social series features frontline workers E-Man and Jeramy reading real customer posts and answering in a fun, unscripted style. It targets Californians 45 and under on YouTube, Instagram and connected TV, inside a multilingual digital, TV, radio and print campaign funded by shareholders, not customer bills.

The source records no measurable results; the stated aim is to demonstrate listening — frustrations aired range from wildfire risk to energy costs — as the first step of rebuilding trust.

In early 2025, Pacific Gas and Electric — the 120-year-old utility serving 16 million customers in North and Central California, and by its own admission sitting near record-low customer satisfaction — launched 'Open Lines' with independent agency Duncan Channon: a campaign built on airing customers' grievances from the internet rather than burying them.

The social series stars Vacaville frontline workers E-Man and Jeramy, who read real customer posts and answer them in fun, unscripted, easy-to-understand style, aimed at Californians 45 and under on YouTube, Instagram and connected TV. It extends the initial Open Lines spots, which showed PG&E executives in face-to-face conversations with actual customers earlier in the year.

The turnaround context is explicit: CEO Patti Poppe's philosophy of change centres on 'leading with love', and 'because love starts with listening', the company chose to give customer concerns airtime. Chief communications and marketing officer David McCulloch called PG&E 'a turnaround story in the making' while conceding customers are sceptical about whether it has really changed. Frustrations addressed range from wildfire risk to energy costs; the campaign is funded by shareholders and does not touch customer bills.

Radical candour answers a trust deficit executives can't fix alone: unscripted frontline workers read the anger verbatim.

The series targets under-45 Californians where they already are — YouTube and Instagram — instead of broadcast alone.

It operationalises the CEO's turnaround philosophy: leading with love starts with listening, so listening becomes the format.

When audiences are sceptical and hurt, they need to be heard before they'll believe you've changed — so put real complaints, and the least polished spokespeople you have, on camera.

The series launched in February 2025 as part of a fully integrated multilingual campaign; the source records no satisfaction or trust measurements yet.