The chicks at....

A big Thank You to Susan for her topic suggestion- "the uncanny ability of the chicks at dunkin donuts to always screw up your coffee." Unfortunately, I don't drink coffee. However, I can attest to several workers with questionable hygiene who have not mastered the proper use of gloves and/or the tissue wrapping required to handle baked goods.*** They insist on touching my baked goods with their bare hands. Many times after a nice cough or sneeze. If you were wondering what that something extra was that your muffin/donut/breakfast sandwich seemed to have, now you know. Most people will smile politely when this happens. I lunge across the counter and scream like a lunatic. "WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? DIDN'T YOUR PARENTS TEACH YOU NOT TO TOUCH OTHER PEOPLE'S FOOD?!?" OK, most of the time I'll just say I changed my mind and walk away but one can dream, can't she?

This topic did make me think, the web is the great equalizer when it comes to consumer complaints. I Googled consumer complaint blogs and got roughly 1.9 million hits. That's a whole lot of complaining. One of the links I followed ranted about a recent incident on Southwest airlines where a financially-strapped and medically-bloated man was flying Southwest to and fro in search of a kidney. As the story goes, a SW employee tried to make the guy purchase a second seat due to their "Customer of Size" policy. Interestingly, a SW employee posted a comment on the story linking to the corporate blog which had a response to the story. Clearly, businesses are taking notice of the blogosphere and actively seeking to manage bad press. You can read about this story here and here.

Next topic?

***This has happened at eating establishments too numerous to mention in and around the financial district. Bring your lunch people, bring your lunch.