Here’s one that’s mainly for fun. But there’s also a moral to the story. And it may also stir-up a few chuckles and/or some wry memories for many readers. It’s all about a ‘surprise’ customers occasionally find in their Fast Food orders…
As you may have guessed from the photo, above, it’s not an extra burger – or, conversely, a shorted order. It’s one of the most universal ways Fast Food rest workers have gagged both their most be-loved and most hated customers.
“Um… Could I get…?”
Are you like me when it comes to ‘begging’ an extra packet of dressing or sauce? Only the most stingy, retrograde Fast Food brands make you pay for extra packets. And at most outlets, the regular staff get to know their regular customers’ preferences.
So it is with Sister Erin and the burger joint she patronizes at lunch two or three times a week. More than one ‘counter service representative’ knows her preferences off by heart. They’ve been known to start punching in her ‘regular’ order as soon as they see her coming through the front door. And that includes sauces and dressings.
But they sometimes play little games with her when she switches up her order for a little variety… Like recently, when she came in early an orderd breakfast burritos rather than her usual lunch sandwich. She asked, just offhand,”Could I get a few extra salsas?”
And when she got home, we discovered no fewer than 27 packets of salsa, more or less evenly split between red and green!
Not even in the same league
Turns out Erin isn’t even in the same league of the current owner of the record for the most sauce packets received in a single takeout order.
Well, Michael Spencer may have captured the title of most-sauce-packet-gifted Fast Food customer
Mike is a member of (and this is a real Facebook thread, folks!) The Dull Men’s Club. But his latest post proves he’s anything but dull! He shared a photo of the 143 classic Taco Sauces he got in his latest order from Taco Bell.
My take
It may seem like a harmless prank to the average Fast Food order bagger. They think of those packets as included, and assume they’re free. But they represent a cost to the boss – to the resto’s bottom line. And you may be surprised to discover that cost is roughly $0.10 per packet!
So the characters at Mike’s go-to Taco Bell cost their employer something like $14.00! And that’s many times the profit the boss expected to have made on that order.That’s just another cost that Fast Food operators must eventually pass on to customers if they want to stay i business…
It’s a 21st Century version of the eternal verity: “There is no free lunch!” – Especially not the sauce packet!
~ Maggie J.