Place: Cici's Pizza
Lunch: Buffet, Dr Pepper
Yes, again. Bite me.
Recently over on Twitter, I made mention that I had a story about Cheddar's, a chain of casual dining restaurants in the Midwest that's sort of like Applebee's or Chili's. The name itself is stupid because they never really had anything on the menu that focused on cheese, let alone cheddar.
Anyway, @wichitabyeb, a fine blogger if there ever was one, was interested in hearing it, and since I've been short of material for the blog lately, I figured I'd share it. It's a great example of not only how not to do business, but how to take advantage of somebody's else's mistake.
Years ago (we're talking ten-fifteen years here), we had a local Cheddar's outlet. It was pretty much the Sunday standard eating place for me and my wife. We ate there more than any other restaurant.
One day, we went in and the entire staff was new. Everybody who used to be there was gone. And the menu had been revamped significantly.
The service, and the food, was mediocre. It wasn't a terribly pleasant experience. But it was nothing like the experience that came with dessert...the delight known as the Cookie Monster (which, thankfully, survived the menu revamp).
The Cookie Monster is a big freshly cooked chocolate chip cookie topped with a big scoop of vanilla ice cream topped in hot fudge, then topped with whipped cream. And maybe a cherry...I can't remember for sure. Pretty easy to make at home, actually.
So the guy brought it, tripped, and dumped it in my wife's lap. It was all over the front of her shirt.
He looked stunned, stammered some sort of apology, and ran for a rag, I think. He re-appeared. A manager appeared. The manager was concerned if her clothes required dry cleaning. Once he was advised they weren't, he seemed satisfied and left, never to return.
The server came back...with the check. Which included the Cookie Monster dumped in her lap.
The wife was mad enough before we even ordered the Cookie Monster. Now she just wanted out of there as quickly as possible. We actually paid. And left.
So I wrote a letter to Cheddar's corporate about it, which was ignored. I then wrote to the local paper. The editor of the weekly entertainment section and I had kind of become friends and I'd written a few guest restaurant reviews over the years. So I wrote up this story, and she published it.
One day later, I got a letter in the mail.
We'd like to apologize for your experience at Cheddars. We would like to show you what a real restaurant experience should be like. Please accept the enclosed certificate for two free dinners on us. We look forward to meeting you.
Sincerely yours,
(name)
General Manager...
Cracker Barrel
The local Cracker Barrel saw an opportunity and jumped on it.
I once told this story at a Fred Pryor seminar as an example of a company jumping on an opportunity another screwed up.
I wouldn't be surprised if the host of that seminar is still using that story today.
Cheddar's has long since closed.
Good riddance.
