It's a small world after all!

What has prompted me to start "My Snarky Corner"

Do you ever wonder how the world can be so big...yet seem so small? Take for instance. I follow several blogs and yesterday I go to one of them....it's one of those awesome mom blogs..you know the ones that have the cute pictures of their kids and their lives....the ones that make you feel completely inadequate...yeah that one! "Awesome Mom" is doing a complete remodel(down to the studs)on the home of my childhood memories. I was all ready to see the pictures of all her and "Awesome Dad's" hard work...when instead I was hit right smack in the face with this!

Crash Landing
I have had the "opportunity" to deal with some very poor business practices lately. I am no business genius, but I find myself giving business advice to total strangers/business owners. Unfortunately, I have been the victim consumer in the situations.

I bought gift cards for my family to The Landing restaurant for Christmas just 4 weeks ago. When my parents went to redeem theirs on their special night out, they were denied and told there was a new manager and that they were not honoring them. Then they were told to call the number on the card to see if "there was even a balance on there." Confused my parents left and went elsewhere to eat. You can imagine how upset I was so I marched myself down there at 8 o'clock PM in my painting attire (thank you very much) and demanded an explanation. The harried manager/owner, Rachelle, came over to me and proceeded to dump on me her business woes and how she was cleaning up the prior owner's mess. For 20 minutes. No joke. She kept telling me that she did not actually buy the business The Landing and that there were "no assets" to be transferred so they could not lose more money on patrons' gift cards. She said she was just renting the building...

HUH?!

I was so angry and shocked. I had given these to my family for Christmas!! They had not used them!!

Then this woman had the nerve to get in my face and tell me to stop rolling my eyes at her and that I was being "hostile." Crazy. I still had no clear explanation or apology or a way to get my money back (it is a significant amount).

Another manager came out and had some class and clarity. He explained to me that the previous owner of The Landing, Josh Rogers, had walked out. Done. Finito. And this woman Rachelle and her husband agreed to open a completely new restaurant in its place to keep the employees employed. The owner of the property wants it to remain The Landing in some way to remain a landmark, so that's why the name is the same. Interestingly though, the new owner Rachelle is on facebook for the restaurant acting like it was just closed for repairs and to get a new menu and that The Landing is now open...lies.

Well, ok then. I get it. Still stinks but ok. I then told the woman that she should not treat future customers like this if she wants her business to succeed. I mean, I know way too much about her business and how the past owner left her with a $2000 trash bill...not for me to know. Anyway, I am sure she was tired and stressed about how her restaurant was about to fail just one week in.

Apparently the former owner is to blame but SOMEBODY owes me DINNER or MY MONEY!!! sheesh. Hey Josh Rogers.. when are you cooking me dinner?!

Now....as soon as I picked my jaw up off of my desk...I called "Awesome Mom" and we talked about what happened and I explained to her that I know Josh and this is NOT Josh...I asked her if it would be okay if I sent the above Post to Josh and she said sure....I called Josh and told him what I tripped over and would it be okay if I sent him the post.....Josh is an upstanding guy...one of the good ole boys...and of course I knew he would not want his name tarnished in this way. I gave "Awesome Mom" Josh's phone number and email and this is the update.....

Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Crash Landing...the updated saga
So I have a family member who knows the previous owner of The Landing and she spoke with him about this today. He DID in fact sell the business to these new people of Rachelle's The Landing and in the sale the gift card balances were addressed. And as I suspected, the guy is a good guy and sent me his contact info to make it right. Well well...that's refreshing and disheartening at the same time because that means the new owner was LYING to me. boooo.

My husband spoke to him (previous owner) and he actually offered to refund the money. Nice, but I kind of feel bad for taking the money because it's these new peeps who owe me, right? I cannot believe these new owners are telling these sob stories when it seems they can only blame themselves. Hmmm what to do? I normally don't get all controversial and loud, but I really feel there are tons (according to new owner) of gift card holding patrons who were cheated. Cryin shame!

The moral of this story is........you can't treat people like that....you can't talk trash about people like that...you can't tarnish someone's reputation like that...cause you never know what "Snarky Mom" is lurking around the corner!!!!