Hey! Krystal! Are you there?! Reader Josh sent two letter complaining about his local burger franchise and hasn’t heard a peep in response. Not even “we’re taking it seriously” or “your opinion is important to us.” Nothing!
Josh writes:
Hi guys…
My name is Josh, and a friend of mine suggested that I might come to you guys for some help. I’ve kind of engaged in some letter writing to the Krystal corporation all thanks to the restaurant down the road, and I seem to be being ignored. It’s weird; I don’t actually want anything from Krystal – all I want is an apology, or even an acknowledgment that someone’s bothering to read the complaint letter department. Anyways, I’ve written about it on my own blog, and he suggested I might try you guys. So here goes nothing.
I live in Donelson, Tennessee (a suburb of Nashville), right down the street from a Krystal. I love Krystals – for those of you not from the South, they’re very similar to White Castle burgers. Anyways, the Krystal down the street from me is pretty incompetent. Really, really incompetent. To the point where I finally did something I’d never done in my life, and I wrote a letter. Went to their website, found the complaint form, and wrote the following:
To whom it may concern:
I genuinely feel that you may be missing out on a magnificent opportunity to get some press for your Krystal restaurant in Donelson, Tennessee. It is rare that you see a fast food franchise attempt to take on such a massive challenge as this one, and even rarer to find them succeeding.
You see, there is an old phrase, “Even a broken clock is right twice a day.” The idea is to show that every person or organization, no matter how incompetent, how wrong-headed, is not wrong 100% of the time. It’s a noble, optimistic saying.
Your Donelson Krystal restaurant has taken on the considerable challenge of proving this saying wrong, and they seem to be succeeding (so to speak) magnificently. Of my last five trips to this Krystal, all but one of them have necessitated me returning to the store to fix my order. This is an impressive accomplishment. I have worked fast food, so I know that while mistakes are made, they are not as common as people feel, and most of the time they are the results of inattention or rushes. Yet, your fine employees have managed to bungle my orders at all times of the day, in any number of variations, no matter how busy or not they may be.
Adding to their style is the ridiculously slow speed with which they manage to bungle my orders. You would think that a restaurant so dedicated to such blunders would at least do so quickly, to have the pretext of being in a rush to keep the customers happy. However, this Krystal manages to take an eternity for even the simplest orders, rendering me not only late for whatever I was doing, but doubly late because I now have to go and get my order corrected.
You are thinking to yourself, “Surely this must be because your order is so complicated. Surely no restaurant could mangle orders so constantly unless they were complicated.” But no. This Krystal manages to even make a mockery of a request for plain burgers. That’s right. To get these orders right, all they have to do is to do nothing. And they still get it wrong. What commitment to their goal!
But to focus on their inability to follow simple directions is to sell the staff of this fine establishment far short. How could we not discuss their rude natures, their incivility, their lack of sympathy? On precisely no occasions that I have had to drive back from my house to correct my orders has anyone apologized, offered me a discount, or even asked if I wanted my drinks filled. Instead, I am greeted with withering stares and disdain, as if I am imposing by requesting that the food I paid for be correct. Especially with gas prices rapidly climbing, most people would succumb to regret or contrition, knowing that they have effectively raised the price of my meal by a decent percentage by making me waste gas. And yet your sterling staff crushes these human weaknesses, ignoring me for as long as possible before begrudgingly giving me what I asked for in the first place.
There are so, so many more issues I could discuss about this store. Could I discuss the time that they only had two employees at the store, but told no one, so the drive thru backed into the street, and people who walked in were greeted by a cook who politely inquired, “What do you want?” while rolling eyes? Or when a manager yelled obscenities at employees while coming in through the front door? Or their mysterious tendency to never have receipt paper, meaning that we have no way of confirming orders or what we paid?
But here is the most simple way to illustrate the impact this store has had on me: they have made me feel as though it is my job to check my order before I leave the store. Imagine being so successful at your incompetence that you have successfully made your customers feel that they are to blame for your mistakes, and that they bear the responsibility of making sure they get what they are asking for.
In the end, I am unsure if your restaurant is a massively successful performance art installation designed to prove how truly miserable a fast food experience could be. If so, bravo, good sirs. If not, then I can only applaud your employees and staff at their incredible incompetence, inhumanity, and miraculous consistency of ineptitude. Clearly they are wasted here; they should have themselves positions in the federal government. I think would fit in perfectly with the good people at FEMA, no doubt.
In conclusion, I find myself wondering tonight why I continue to frequent this Krystal. Yes, I love the food. Yes, it is close to my house. But with such incredible incompetence on display, you would think that I would have learned to stay away. Maybe I finally am.
Sincerely,
Josh
Now, that was on May 18th. I got nothing as a result of this letter. Not an acknowledgment, not even an automated “We thank you for writing to us” letter. I don’t really want anything back; all I would like is some sort of comment that a) they listen to compaints and b) would like to apologize for how I was treated.
But nothing.
Now, this past Sunday, my wife ended up stopping at Krystal to pick me up some dinner. The resulting drive-thru trip took 30 minutes, over which period of time…well, here’s the next letter I wrote.
To whom it may concern:
I have complained about the Donelson branch of Krystal twice in the past, and been ignored. I would have thought that a long, detailed letter expressing irritation at your restaurant would have been responded to, but apparently not. Perhaps it’s because my letter was long. Here’s a simple version of tonight’s events for your apparently simple minds.
1. When we tried to order dinner, we were told that the restaurant had run out of fries. Then it turned out that they hadn’t really – he just hadn’t checked.
2. AFTER ordering, AFTER paying, my wife was told that it would take 7-9 minutes to get food. She was thus stuck in her car with a fussy child for ten minutes, rather than getting the quick dinner we were hoping for. And ten minutes for Krystals? RIDICULOUS.
3. Finally, they brought the Krystals, but told my wife that their heat lamp has broken. Did I still want cold fries?
4. We asked for our money back. SO THEY TOOK THE FOOD BACK WITH THEM.
5. There was no apology, no explanation.
6. It took FIFTEEN minutes to process a refund.
7. The manager chose to YELL at my wife for being interested in what was taking so long for the refund. His exact words were, “Bear with me. I’m working on it.”
8. He STILL did not apologize.
9. We were there for THIRTY minutes. We received no apology whatsoever.
10. We gave up on getting our money back. We finally got our food again and left. But, they lost the receipt and had to find it.
To give the devil his due, there was a single employee who was kind and understanding to my wife during all of this. Although he did not apologize, he did give my wife a pack of cookies, telling her, “Give this to the little one for having to wait.”
This is inexcusable, offensive, and disrespectful. This has managed to do what no amount of health talk or bad experience has done before – I will not return to a Krystal restaurant again until I have received either an apology, an explanation, or I have been assured that your entire moronic, pathetic staff at this restaurant has been replaced by someone more intelligent and sympathetic, like a dog or a cardboard box. I have eaten Krystal since I was a young boy, and I will miss it and the considerable amount of business I have done there, but I am sick of being treated with disrespect, disdain, and contempt by your corporation.
This time, I sent it through the complaint form, the question form, the suggestion form, AND the compliment form, just in the hopes of being read.
Nothing.
Look – I don’t want much. All I want is an apology, someone to say “Hey, maybe we shouldn’t treat our customers this way.” But I have gotten nothing, and I would have thought that my wife being YELLED AT by the manager might have merited such. But no.
It just seems to me that it’s disingenuous to have a complaint and feedback form if you’re going to ignore it.
Do I have a valid issue? Or do I need to just let it go?
Josh is clearly passionate about his concerns, and while he invested more time pursuing his complaint than we would recommend, it’s not unreasonable for him to expect some response.
C’mon Krystal, showing up is half the battle. Take a minute and crank out a form letter.
(Photo: Wikipedia)
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In their defense, even I stopped halfway through that letter.
Still, they should at least purchase an automated responder…
Maybe a corporate executive type is waiting for a long flight to read it all.
The letter’s writer could use a valuable lesson in tact. Whether his orders were wrong or not, he sounds like the stereotypical problem customer.
I disagree. He sounds articulate and somewhat thoughtful, if long-winded.
I never do this, but wow that letter was long. It took two and a half paragraphs to get to the problem. Even when my fiancee and I are arguing we make it a point to get to the point.
Less is more my friend.
Or maybe they got the orders wrong because you took 2 minutes setting up the story of what you wanted to order and they tuned out. I kid, I kid.
Not being from the south, are these the most awesomely delicious burgers one could possibly ever find, and do they only have them every 15 square miles? I would figure that after the first 4 times, he would find another Krystal or find a different burger joint.
Unless they’re made of Krystal Meth, of course.
Maybe no one is responding because there’s absolutely no way they can win with the OP? The “Somebody owes me an apology” crowd is exactly the kind of customer they don’t want. However, the OP is not doing himself any favors by continuing to patronize the restaurant. They’d run themselves out of business eventually if you’d stop going.
Josh should throw out his thesaurus. It doesn’t impress people when you use sentence constructions like, “If not, then I can only applaud your employees and staff at their incredible incompetence, inhumanity, and miraculous consistency of ineptitude.”, it just makes you look like a pretentious ass. Inhumanity? Give me a break.
I’m not one to blame the consumer, but he needs to learn that clarity is more important than using a lot of big words, especially when his sentence construction is so tortured. It sounds like the staff at that particular Krystal is staggeringly incomptent, but he doesn’t need to write a doctoral thesis about it.
Perhaps insulting the entire company by calling the lot of them “simple minds” is not the best way to get yourself an apology or response.
Also what type of entitled person would you have to be in order to ask that an entire store of employees be fired?
And the manager simply saying “Bear with me. I’m working on it” is not yelling. I wish we could hear the second side of the story….
Carey – it’s a BAD letter written with weak sarcasm. A non-story if there ever was one. And you turned the headline into something akin to the Second Coming.
Please ratchet your weekend articles down a bit. I’d love for Consumerist to stay relevant, not to lose its value over these bottom-of-the-barrel stories with larger-than-life headlines.
Wow man get to the point. The first letter was so snarky. If I worked for Krystals I would have tossed it in the trash. If you put as much effort into writing a proper complaint letter as you did writing that sarcastic heap of crap you might increase your chances of having a dialogue with the company. Instead they probably think your nuts. I know I do.
I think the OP is being unfair. A broken clock is right twice a day, or about 8% of the time, where as Krystal is right once out of five times, or 20% of the time.
@jacques: No, they suck. They run right through you… and not in a good way.
I’m the only person who thought his letter was funny? The performance art line was priceless.
If you have to write a complaint letter, might as well have a good time doing it.
Both letters look more like bad attempts at comedy routines than actual complain letters. He’s so busy with the snark he leaves out important details like dates, times, what he ordered (“dinner” doesn’t cut it), and the address of the restaurant.
@crooshjef: If you have to write a complaint letter, might as well have a good time doing it.
Fair enough, but you’re wasting your time when your fun completely buries the complaint.
Well, the letter is a bit long, but the Krystal corp really doesn’t seem to care much about their stores.
There are four or more Krystal stores around Huntsville, AL and all of them are poorly staffed and managed. They are still strangely appealing, just like in “Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle” – when you have a craving for a Krystal, nothing else is quite right. They also have a really good new pomegranate slushy and free Wi-Fi.
But, oh my god, the bad service. Most stores are open late or all night, but sometimes there is only one person there. My wife and kids went to one the other night around 8PM. They were the only customers and there were two people working. When they got their food, they asked for ketchup and the guy said, “We’re out of ketchup packets.” My wife said, well one of our burgers has ketchup from your dispenser in the back, can you just put some ketchup in a cup or on a lid for us? Unbelievably, the guy said, “No. If I did that for you, I’d have to do it for everyone.”
And that was a relatively good trip in that they did get the food they ordered within 15 or 20 minutes – something you can’t always count on.
So if anyone finds some good corporate contacts, let us know. I’ve got a lot of complaints
while i realize the letters were long, they were quite good reads. regardless of the length, it is Krystal’s responsibility to respect their patrons by a reply. apparently, they don’t care. i would say that if one has stock in Krystal, perhaps it is best to sell. they’re not going to be lasting much longer if this is the customer service provided.
In short, Josh, learn to fucking write.
Wow, it’s really not hard to implement into exchange server an automated response to a certain e-mail address. But yes in Krytals defense, no wonder they didn’t respond if you wern’t so long winded maybe you’d get a response.
A broken clock is right twice a day, unless it’s one of those like the one on my VCR that thinks it’s midnight as soon as you plug it in and starts counting off minutes right then and there as if I programmed it for midnight.
OP if they dont check the freezer for a pack of fries what chance do you think you have of corporate checking the inbox on their complaint form?
Well, thats one more company to earmark on my personal blacklist; at least until they can prove us all wrong with a show of faith.
@nyaz: on the contrary I would assume a detailed response would receive better attention than Hey The Food Sucks.
OP may I suggest trying your luck by sending them a fake compliment and see if they dont respond.
Funny – not only does Krystal taste like White Castle, they have the same kind of “dedication” to customer service. I once got violently sick after eating at White Castle. Not sick like “oh I just ate White Castle” but sick like “I feel really ill [vomit] I think I have food poisoning [more vomiting].”
I wrote and complained. In their written response, they accused me of making up the story and enclosed a refund check that had under the endorsement a statement saying I wouldn’t sue them.
It was all very confidence building.
At least it’s only one restaurant. That’s how ALL the fast food restaurants are here in Detroit.
Hey guys…
Well, I’m the guy who wrote the letter. I wanted to say that most of you were right about the letter being too long – I have no doubt that it factored into the lack of response. Honestly, with the first letter, I was taking crooshjef’s feeling about it; I figured that if I wanted to write a complaint letter, I might as well have some fun. Honestly, I was more just really, really irritated at that point rather than really angry.
Anyways, I got the advice to try an EECB, and it worked perfectly. I did that Friday night, and by Saturday morning, I had a personal phone call from the district supervisor for Krystal, who took lots of notes and apologized profusely. Honestly, that’s all I wanted – I told him, when he offered, that I didn’t want any free food, and that I just wanted a) someone to say they were sorry for the way the restaurant was run and b) someone to at least pretend to read complaint letters.
By the way, a couple of people mentioned that I didn’t mention the restaurant, the time/date of the visit, or the orders themselves – that was actually all taken care of in a form that attached to the complaint letter.
In the end, you guys are right, but the first letter was just meant as a way of airing frustration and alerting people that there were some serious issues with the restaurant. My hope was that they might take the idea that if one person is taking the time to write (admittedly, too much time, but I don’t complain often, and if I had browsed this site first, I would have written it differently), they would at least understand that there was an issue. It was the lack of response – not even an automated one – that upset me.
Anyways, a few responses:
@jacques – they’re really great burgers, but there aren’t a whole lot around me. There’s the one right down the road, and then not another for a significantly further distance.
@prions – it was very much the tone, not the wording. It was kind of hard to explain in an e-mail, but I was doing my best.
” I will not return to a Krystal restaurant again until I have received either an apology, an explanation, or I have been assured that your entire moronic, pathetic staff at this restaurant has been replaced by someone more intelligent and sympathetic, like a dog or a cardboard box.”
If I got this letter on my desk, I’d throw it away without responding.
The only fastfood restaurant I ever go to is Harvey’s in Canada. If you go into the restaurant they make everything to order in front of you. It takes a couple minutes but it’s worth it. At least as worth it as fast food can be.
TL,DR.
Plus…
Have 3 bad experiences with one restaurant? STOP GIVING THEM BUISINESS.
tl;dr
These might help:
Brad Wahl
bwahl@krystalco.com
423-757-1515
800-458-5841
VP Marketing
Glen Griffiths
ggriffiths@krystalco.com
423.757.5661
(800) 458-5912
VP Franchise Development
Jo Price
jprice@krystalco.com
Franchise Development
(423) 757-5601
(800) 458-5912
Toll Free Phone: (800) 458-5912
Primary Contact: Ms. Carolyn Stringer
Primary Contact Title: Assistant to President
Secondary Contact: Mr. Fred Exum Jr.
Secondary Contact Title: President/COO
Info E-Mail Address: cstringer@krystalco.com
Fred Exum Jr.
fexum@krystalco.com ?
President and CEO
(I added the last one has it seems the email addressing convention they are using is “first_letter_of_first_name followed by full_last_name”)
Personally, I’d start with Ms. Stringer and go from there. Good luck.
@twophrasebark: I’m not surprised you got sick. Both Krystal & White Castle make tiny burgers that require the big sweaty goon in the kitchen to finger every square inch of the patty, bun and cheese in the assembly process.
Oh my gosh, tl;dr. Get to the point, man.
This is what happened.
This is when it happened.
This is who did it.
That is your complain letter. Period.
“We asked for our money back. SO THEY TOOK THE FOOD BACK WITH THEM.” That’s called a RETURN.
I agree, Krystal is amazing, but it’s not worth this. Stop feeling so superior, and stop going there.
My dogs are much more sympathetic than a cardboard box, and I assure you that if there are fires to be found, they will find them.
But seriously. A story about bad service at a fast food restaurant and a company that doesn’t know how to answer whiny e-mails?
I guess you’ve run out of laundry scoops to measure and iPhone users to insult?
By the way, I wanted to, in a brief moment of self-defense, let you guys know (whenever this posts) that when I did the EECB, I followed the Consumerist’s e-mail complaint form to a T – very short, to the point, and expressed my issue.
To be fair to myself, I’ve never frequented the site, and I’ll be the first to admit that I could have written the letters better. The first was trying to have fun while complaining, in the hopes maybe of being more memorable and getting the point across without being an ass. As for the second…I was really pissed, and tried to express myself, but I wasn’t really focused on getting my point across.
Sony won’t respond to my written letters either, asking why someone got their PS3 fixed via the Consumerist w/o receipt and I was rejected when I asked for warranty service.
Yes, the first “complaint” is horrible, yet strangely compelling in its grandiose over-reaching. Fun fact; it ends on a total non-sequitar. “Maybe I finally am.”
Finally am “what”, exactly? “Learned”? Now, had you been “learning” to avoid their incompetence in the sentence prior, it would actually approach decent english, but your penultimate passage and your final one are, placed together, completely broken.
Too clever by half!
I’ve been to that location once or twice and haven’t had any problems. After the first bad experience, though, I’d stop going. Returning after your first snarky letter and then writing a second one tells the management you’re not serious about not giving them your business. Plus, dude, there’s one on Murfreesboro Road not far from the one you’re bitching about. Give it a try.
BTW, Krystals are WAY better than White Castles (it’s the mustard), but WC’s fries are better.
Look in the circular file, and you’ll find your complaints!
Maybe the cashier got lost in the preamble and then missed the sprinkled parts of the ramble where Josh actually gave his order. There is something to be said about Soup Nazi etiquette when placing an order.
This guy is clearly not a goon. “Good sirs” is a bannable offense. Because it’s really annoying.
Another question to consider is if this Krystal is corporate or a privately owned franchise. There was an absolutely HORRIBLE McDonald’s near where I used to work and, though there were regular complaints filed from everyone I ever knew that ate there, there was never anything done. I tried it 3 times, as there was not much choice late at night, and found out after my 3rd complaint that they were a privately owned franchise and McDonald’s corporate couldn’t really do anything as long as they were, barely, passing the health inspections.
Take your licks and never go back. ITS NOT WORTH IT.
Both letters have their problems.
Letter #1: Far too long, doesnt get to the point quickly enough. Second, what exactly is the problem, and what does he expect them to do about it? I don’t feel this was clear. It kind of just rambled on and on about how they never get anything right.
Letter #2: Starting the letter off by insulting the reader is going to get you nowhere. I understand the concerns, but to open the letter by insulting is not the way to vent your frustrations.
Someone want to shoot me over the Monarch Notes version of these letters?
@twophrasebark: That’s why their slogan is “Buy ‘em by the sackful — puke ‘em by the roadside.”
Funny how no one ever ever sympathizes with the people who are complaining. Why did he not give up? Maybe he has dedication to their chain, or maybe he was too lazy. Who knows. I feel that attacks to the original posters are getting kind of weak, and is becoming the norm with all of these comments/talkbacks.
Once I read the second paragraph of the first one, I stopped caring. Not that the second paragraph said anything dumb, just that it was the second paragraph of ten.
So I skipped the rest of that epic and went to the one with a list,
And now I don’t get what the second complaint is… well… complaining about. “my food took 10 minutes and then when I didn’t want it they took it back” or “they told us they were out of fries so it took time to make them but the heat lamp was broken so they couldn’t make them warm and they never explained why the fries were cold and late”
The letters are clearly rude. I wouldn’t respond either.
Well I can only guess that this a franchise that isn’t well run. As for the employees being rude and idiotic, well, it is a fast-food franchise, they probably make minimum wage, and Krystal corporate no doubt cares about them as much as they do these complaint letters, so what can you do?
Find another location, or better yet, another restaurant chain altogether, preferably one that doesn’t sell fried, fatty and greasy food. You shouldn’t be eating that stuff anyway.
“This Krystal manages to even make a mockery of a request for plain burgers. That’s right. To get these orders right, all they have to do is to do nothing. And they still get it wrong.”
If Krystal is as much like White Castle as the OP says, then the burgers are grilled on a bed of onions, so the cooks have to scrape the onions off to give you plain burgers.
Being concise and not insulting your target audience are good rules to follow in writing complaint letters (or any letters, really).