I actually can see it traveling pretty fast. District Manager calls Store Manager to find out how things are going. Store Manager does a "You gotta hear this return reason...". Or, the someone at the store calls corporate to find out what to code this return as. Never underestimate the number of stories that start "This guy gave returned it because....".

Internally at MSFT we have support discussion lists that are used by field personnel to interact with the product team; our VP is on the alias and sometimes answers questions with the products that they used to directly work on.

Granted, joining a discussion list is easier than monitoring product returns, but there is probably an analog for the retail channel (i.e., there is probably an upwards-facing report on iPad 2 sales and returns, and this note was probably included as an item of interest). I'm just guessing though.

Odds are that anybody who really knows isn't going to tell you.