There has been a lot of bashing lately on the fast food worker. Whenever the $15 minimum wage in Seattle comes up, someone always mentions the typical "unskilled fast food worker." I get annoyed at this, because the hardest job I've ever worked was in fast food, and they totally deserve $15 if anyone in this world does. I think we should be picking on those girls that work at the tanning salons that sit and watch whatever TV show they want for their whole shift if we are going to pick on anyone. When it comes to food, the general public is just plain mean...and that is coming from someone who worked in a phone store where half your customers are in because of a problem worth a lot more than a couple dollars. Not only that, but you have to memorize tons of combinations, and have to actually run around for your whole shift in a stressful situation trying to get orders out as quickly as possible, reaching every which way around your co-workers. Customers feel like they are way better than you because you are working a minimum wage job, and treat you like dirt. I think people still wouldn't chose this job, they just like to pick on people because they are mad they aren't making much at their job.
Anyway, this was on my mind today at my office job where I am making much more money than that at least, but I also miss those days where your coworkers were all your age and while stressful and physically tiring, we managed to find fun. I actually had to fake a coughing fit because I was laughing at some of our old antics. I thought I would stare a few stories from the times at DQ:
1.
The Lettuce
As mentioned before, customers are very particular. That's no problem, it is just sometimes hard when rushed to keep up with special orders. One particular customer came in and specified they wanted no lettuce. They hated lettuce. Please don't put lettuce on their burger. OK, fine. I typed the "No" then the "lettuce" button so the screen would show this. The kitchen made their order which I didn't observe, then sent their order out. Seconds later the man comes back and shows me the burger. Definitely lettuce. He didn't want to peel it off because it left lettuce taste or something (I agree with this on things like olives, peppers, etc, but lettuce seems pretty plain). Ok, we will make another one. The kitchen worker was annoyed and calls me back. He had placed a piece of lettuce about the size of my pinky fingernail on the hamburger just to spite the customer. I thought it was hilarious and the order went out. We quietly laughed to ourselves thinking he got away with it. As the customer was leaving after their meal, they walked by the front counter and smiling said "I saw that piece of lettuce, good one" and all three of us laughed pretty hard.
2.
Too hot
Our store did not have air conditioning. Combine the summer heat, the excess of customers when it is hot causing non-stop work, and the drive through window letting in the heat from outside amplified with car engines, it gets hot. The solution when you need a break is to "re-stock" the toppings. This means you go in the walk-in freezer (about 10 degrees F) and fan in the coolness up your shirt while eating delicious toppings like cookie dough, cheesecake bites, brownies, and various candy bars.
3.
Large cone
A customer came through our drive through and ordered an "extra large cone." "I'm sorry, we just have large as our biggest size." She insisted we make an extra large in a very rude tone and the customer is always right. I informed her I could charge her for two larges and make it big. She said rudely how that's fine but it better be big if she's paying more money. I told my friend Brandon to make it as big as we possibly can make it. The large size cones are already pretty huge (your typical cake cone is a small size) so it was already going to be fat, but we were cracking up as he almost had to curve the ice cream to make enough height to fit it. We ended up getting it about a foot tall (the ice cream part alone, not including the cone.) She pulled up and paid her $5 or so. As my friend started to hand her the cone, she was FURIOUS. The problem was that she had been so insistent on a giant cone that she couldn't complain beyond angry noises. She had to tilt the cone to get it through her car window, and still managed to scrape the top off while trying to fit it. We were dying.
4
.No nuts
A man came in and asked if the brownie blizzard had nuts. This is a common question since many people make brownies with nuts, and I said no. My friend in the previous post made the blizzard and sent it out. The next thing I saw was the man angry to the point I was scared and was marching up to the counter. "YOU SAID NO NUTS!" Well yes, it doesnt come with nuts. "THERE ARE NUTS IN THIS!" I asked my friend if he made it wrong, he said no. Angry man then proceeds to scoop out his blizzard onto the counter spoon by spoon to prove that there were nuts in it, all the while telling me he is allergic and he is going to die and it will be our fault and we are getting sued, etc. There was not a single nut on that counter mess. Now we have signs on the door saying we aren't nut-free. You do not want to visit a DQ if you want nut free. The toppings all fall into each other (as I'm sure happened here- one nut) and we use the same mixers on everything so you are getting contact anyways. We just stared at him and his lack of proof, then he stormed out. I hope he didn't die.
5
. Drive thru
Sometimes it would be slow (like in winter) and we would try to entertain ourselves.
-My friend Bryant used to answer the speaker "*beat box* wika wika welcome to DQ order when you're ready *DJ record scratch noise*"
-We would take turns talking which always made people laugh. One answered the call, the next person would say something like "what sauce?" another person say the total, etc. It was usually fairly obvious because we'd use different accents and the switch between male and female.
-My friend did his gay voice (he kind of looked metro so it was convincing) and wrote a phone number on a receipt to give to a man customer
-We would all hide under the window and when the car drove up we would slowly pop up elevator style with straight faces to collect the money/deliver food.
-When customers started to drive off, we clapped and cheered at them for an entire night. Quite a few would stop the car and laugh.
I can't think of any more right now, but I do have a word of advice- be nice to food workers! Even if they aren't doing anything illegal like spitting, they can still do things like make everything smaller or sloppier, or charge you more. For example if you order a snickers blizzard with peanuts, hot fudge and bananas, I could charge a snickers blizzard add fudge, add bananas, add peanuts (cosing you and extra $1.50) or I could do a menu blizzard with multiple toppings with swaps like a banana split blizzard instead of strawberries use snickers instead of pineapple use peanuts, and instead of syrup use hot fudge. You just get better service when you treat people nicely!
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