Restaurant's scathing response to 'rude' customer complaint
“The customer is always right!” is the mantra those working in the hospitality industry are bound by.
But a high-end restaurant has people on social media cheering for its response to a “rude” customer who described their food and surroundings as “crap.”
The customer in question sent Träkol, in Gateshead, UK, an email complaining about everything from their “crap” food and surroundings to wine described as “budget supermarket garbage.”
Instead of replying to the email privately, the restaurant’s management decided to share their takedown of the customer to social media.
THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT… UNLESS THEY ARE VERY VERY RUDE AND VERY VERY WRONG and sometimes, even in hospitality, you just have to say it like it is… x pic.twitter.com/OJTeO2zYVi
— ByTheRiverBrewCo (@BTRBrewCo) February 11, 2019
Hitting back at his “personal attack” they took to Twitter to write “the customer is always right… unless they are very very rude and very very wrong” before sharing both the customer’s email and their response.
In his original email the customer described himself as “self-employed from a wealthy background and well educated (privately, obviously).”
“I have eaten in the best restaurants of Newcastle, Europe and the Caribbean,” he continued.
“I can honestly say I have never eaten such crap food in crap surroundings and payed at least four times what the food was worth.”
He went on to say that the restaurant was “making very good staff serve crap food at extortionate prices.”
A post shared by ByTheRiverBrewCo (@bytheriverbrewco) on Feb 12, 2019 at 9:09am PST
But the restaurant, owned by By The River Brew Co, weren’t going to take the criticism, which they saw as unfair, lying down, so they issued a brilliant response to the diner, pointing out his “barbed and rather insulting tone.”
“Thank you for your mail – as a self-employed, wealthy, privately educated individual we would have thought you would have understood the difference between bread and bred,” the company started their post.
“Whilst we are always welcoming of comments, critique and well-reasoned complaints in this case we must take umbrage to your mail which we feel is simply a personal attack,” they continued.
“The chef is neither vegan nor ‘thick’ – a bit chunky maybe… but thick? No definitely not.
“He is, as the whole team here at By The River are extremely passionate about what we serve here as a local, independent operator.”
In a cheeky response to his comments on their wine list they wrote: “Please let us know which supermarkets you source these wines at budget prices from (we imagine you are a Waitrose kind of guy?) and we will be straight down there with our bags for life to stock up.”
Since sharing their response, other diners have taken to social media to give props to the staff for their witty reply.
— Rachel Kershaw (@rachmotormouth) February 11, 2019
Well, you’ve just earned yourself more customers the next time we’re down south. Brilliant response to an utterly terrible person. 👏
— StirlingGin (@StirlingGin) February 11, 2019
I’m sat here shouting far too many four letter words on behalf of you guys… shocking behaviour.. please keep smashing out the amazing food and service that you guys do.. love from me and mine x
— damian broom (@dmnbrm77) February 11, 2019
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