A POPULAR jewellers in Andover has been left disheartened after its Instagram account was deleted and is now calling for people to support its new social media account.

Earlier in August, director of David Mellor Jewellers, Amy Mellor, received an email from the parent company of Instagram, Meta, saying that the business’s account had been suspended.

The email urged the reader to respond and appeal the decision. Unsure about what she was reading, Amy checked the company’s messages on Instagram and saw the same notification.

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Amy said: “I received an email saying that our account was being suspended and we had 180 days to the decision. After I appealed, 24 hours later, I received an email back which said they aren’t going to give it back.”

A message on Instagram also said that the social media platform would not be reviewing the decision and the company’s account had been disabled.

“It was all a little bit out of the blue and even now I’m struggling to understand,” Amy said.

A friend of a friend who works at Meta tried to help Amy regain the account, but he said the profile was “really restricted and not giving him anything as to why we have been blocked”.

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Amy continued: “It is very deflating; we are extremely frustrated by the situation. When I joined the business full time, when I was 18, joining Instagram was one of the first things I did.”

Amy said that the account and the following the company had built was “11 years in the making”, adding: “It has taken us a really long time to build a really engaged and loyal customer base”.

“We are trying really hard to stay positive and remind ourselves that we can build it back up again,” Amy continued. “Our main ethos and what sets us apart is there is a face to the business. We would always make sure that our posts were personable, and we would do things behind the scenes.

“We’ve just lost 6,000 of those people that were really engaged with that and wanted to support our business.”

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She added: “I thought we’ve dropped off the face of the earth in terms of our digital footprint.”

The business has now started a new Instagram account, David Mellor Watches, and so far, the page has more than 800 followers.

"It is getting the word out, and hopefully it won't take 10-plus years to build. It is just a follow, it doesn't cost anything but it makes such a difference in terms of our brand awareness."

When asked what she would say to Instagram if she got the opportunity, Amy said: “I would just express the fact that they don’t understand the impact they have on a small business. They don’t understand the impact that it can have on mental health and the fact that they don’t offer any support to get in touch with anybody.”

Instagram has been contacted for comment but it has yet to respond.