The restaurant industry is saturated. People have plenty of options to choose from and businesses have to compete for every customer. When the fight is this close, something as simple as a negative online review can have serious implications for the future of an establishment. So when someone gives a restaurant a 1-star rating, some of them decide to respond in an attempt to fill everyone in on the big picture and protect their reputation. Or just diss the OP. Takeaway Trauma is an Instagram account that collects these savage replies. Since its launch in September 2020, the fun little project has acquired quite the collection! Here are some of its most popular ones.
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Bored Panda got in touch with the person behind Takeaway Trauma and even though they want to remain anonymous, they agreed to tell us more about the project. "I'm a big takeaway fan and found myself going to order a delivery and thought I’d check the reviews of a particular establishment. After checking the good reviews, I thought I better check the bad ones also," the creator of Takeaway Trauma recalled its origins.
"I came across the most hilarious reviews and was genuinely crying with laughter. Without really thinking about it, I screenshotted the reviews just for my own personal use to send to friends, etc. People seemed to find them funny so I thought, let's try and curate these and create a page out of it!"
Looking at the images, one can't help but think that people could use a nice gulp of empathy before throwing accusations on the Internet. The creator of Takeaway Trauma shares this belief. "I think people should be more forgiving; people in general are so impatient and want things instantly," they said, adding that we live in a 'now' culture where everyone wants things straight away and wants them to be perfect. "As soon as these high standards aren't met, the natural human reaction is to complain."
"I think a lot of the time, people give too much stick to takeaways, however, with that being said, some of the images of takeaway food I’ve seen really do look awful, so I think you can only really determine it on a case by case basis."
When they first started Takeaway Trauma, they would salvage reviews from TripAdvisor, Just Eat, and all of the main takeaway platforms. Now, however, the account has gotten so big that other people send them in. "I think takeaway reviews and takeaway culture will forever be a growing market so I won't be running out of content any time soon."
The numbers agree. In 2019, the global market for online-ordered prepared food delivery was estimated at $94 billion and it is expected to grow at about 9 percent a year, reaching $134.5 billion in 2023.
The submissions that end up in Takeaway Trauma's inbox still have to get manual approval, though. "I only post ones that I find funny," the creator of the account said. "If they don't resonate with me, I don’t think they’ll resonate with other people."
So far, they are not only funny but also are excellent proof that Wendy's PR team definitely has admirers in the corporate world as well.
Maybe it's wiser not to order food for delivery in a snow storm...
How could they possibly know if someone on a review site has ordered before or not?
Well, the owner said they were away and didn't make it back in time for dinner service, so they weren't actually in town to put said sign on the door. Now, why they didn't update on their facebook or something is another matter.
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'Stressing about what we can eat' - what a fcking snowflake - MAYBE DO WHAT US BUSINESS OWNERS DO, STRESS ABOUT HOW TO BUY A BUSINESS THAT IS NOT APPRECIATED WHEN WE ACTUALLY NEED TO TAKE TIME OUT TO TAKE OUR LOVED ONE'S TO HOSPITAL - OR MAYBE HAVE A DAY OFF. ALTERNATIVELY, F**K OFF AND LEARN HOW TO COOK AND MAYBE ORGANISE YOUR LIFE - TWAT.
I cannot imagine "stressing about what we can eat" in any situation except poverty. Perhaps the poster should reassess his priorities.
Why are you so far down?! This is the best part of the response!!!
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You can't expect that, emergencies happen, I would've considered reasons why they may be closed.
Don't understand: why complaining about the place being closed? U didn't even taste the food or were ill-treated.
I'm sorry to hear that your wife is sick, but if you're going to run a business, you have some responsibility to your customers as well. As another poster says, you could at least have put up a sign or something. Like just today I went to a locksmith and there was a sign on the door saying that his assistant had quit so he was the only one in the shop and he had to go out on a call and he'd be back tomorrow at noon. I thought okay, fair enough. But without the sign, it would be, What happened? Did the place close down? Etc.
It sounds like the appointment for his wife went over what they expected. Have you EVE R heard of a restaurant closing with no notice because they didn't want to cook that night?
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Note: this post originally had 67 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
The most shocking thing here is the fact that neither the customers nor the restaurants know what grammar and punctuation are...
I could barely understand them. How do they run a functioning business and can’t write a sentence?
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In most of these comments the restaurants are being needlessly rude and not addressing the customers issues. The 'fatty' reply was just awful. Responses like most of these would make me less likely to eat at those places than the low star reviews by themselves.
I can't help but notice that almost everyone in these posts (reviewers and responders alike) has atrocious writing skills. Needless abbreviations of 3-letter words, run-on sentences, no capitalization or punctuation, disorganized composition... Is writing education not a thing any longer?
As someone who is currently learning about writing, I can assure you that writing education is a thing. But it is clear that none of the people here bothered to pay attention to it!
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Look. Just because the customer isn't always right does NOT mean they're always WRONG
This article is worded to suggest these a bad customers. Almost all of them are actually the owners being deplorably rude to their customers. Does the writer of this article think this is acceptable behaviour?
Some of these are funny but so many of them are just people that can't accept criticism. If they disagree with a complaint, I don't think it's unreasonable to politely disagree but why on earth would they insult their customers? Those kind of responses scare off future customers too and you'd think they'd fight for every customer right now. Aside from that, some of the replies were just plain nasty and not okay in ANY context.
TL;DR version: Customer: *complains* Owner: "F... You! We are perfect and you suck!" (or some variation).
"69 Times Restaurants Left Hilarious Replies Under Bad Reviews, Shared By This Instagram Page". These replies are NOT hilarious. Seriously, did you even read them, Rokas?
I couldn't finish reading. Was hoping for funny, well-deserved tell-offs to the customer. Found poorly spelled and worded messes from both sides and unfunny, unprofessional, uncalled for owner responses.
Hey. Don’t bring the mentally challenged into this. The person who liked these sorry retorts is just a garbage person. If you have legitimate bad customers you have legitimate bad customers. Not everyone who complains is automatically an asshole.
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This was soooo painful to read. USE PUNCTUTATIONS AND PROPER GRAMMAR! Both the customer and the company. It's good that I don't have a business that gets customer reviews, because I'd state in the review rules (that no one would read) that your comment/review must be readable/legible. I don't mean a typo of a wrong word is bad. But just... capitals, comma's, stops... Please!
I have never had food delivered to my home as I live 200 yards from a Chinese takeaway and have the option of several places in a radius of a mile. I prefer to order & collect in person(even though that means waiting outside because of COVID-19). I do jobs at McDonalds and was surprised at how many people have the food delivered: IMHO the food at these types of restaurants isn't overly warm to start with and is best eaten within 20 mins of preparation. The majority of the posts dealt with business owners who could not handle criticism and were aggressive/insulting in their replies.
The worst part is that neither customers nor restaurants have no idea how to write a sentence. I think they should do a recap on 2nd grade english, it's ridiculous
Although the majority of the customers come across as whining complainers, even more of the businesses emote unprofessionalism. Their atrocious grammar, punctuation and spelling immediately speaks louder than their often rude and inconsiderate replies. I would be completely embarrassed to have my company represented in this fashion.
So often there are two sides to every story. Boredpanda is irresponsible for printing only one side and asking us to believe that is the whole story.
There’s an undercurrent of micro aggression if the chip shop owners and the customer base are from different classes/ethnicities that is likely going unaddressed. So it could be why the shop owners are so defensive. Some of it could just be bad service though. Since most of it is British I think the race/class thing is heavily in play.
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I'd be leery of most of these places. Just because some mentally challenged individual thought the owners' rude, unprofessional (and ungrammatical) replies were witty or clever doesn't mean the customers' complaints weren't valid.
I also noticed the complete absence of writing skills. I tried reading a couple out loud and I almost had a stroke
Ehhhhh good quality bad quality I just wanna eat something now...
Yes, and people keep using them because they don't WANT to cook most of these things themselves. Some people don't like cooking or aren't good at cooking, and sometimes they just want the convenience of takeout. In some cases it's cheaper to do takeout than to buy the ingredients needed to make it, and there are a lot of people who might not be able to afford the grocery trip.
Load More Replies... The most shocking thing here is the fact that neither the customers nor the restaurants know what grammar and punctuation are...
I could barely understand them. How do they run a functioning business and can’t write a sentence?
Load More Replies... In most of these comments the restaurants are being needlessly rude and not addressing the customers issues. The 'fatty' reply was just awful. Responses like most of these would make me less likely to eat at those places than the low star reviews by themselves.
I can't help but notice that almost everyone in these posts (reviewers and responders alike) has atrocious writing skills. Needless abbreviations of 3-letter words, run-on sentences, no capitalization or punctuation, disorganized composition... Is writing education not a thing any longer?
As someone who is currently learning about writing, I can assure you that writing education is a thing. But it is clear that none of the people here bothered to pay attention to it!
Load More Replies... Look. Just because the customer isn't always right does NOT mean they're always WRONG
This article is worded to suggest these a bad customers. Almost all of them are actually the owners being deplorably rude to their customers. Does the writer of this article think this is acceptable behaviour?
Some of these are funny but so many of them are just people that can't accept criticism. If they disagree with a complaint, I don't think it's unreasonable to politely disagree but why on earth would they insult their customers? Those kind of responses scare off future customers too and you'd think they'd fight for every customer right now. Aside from that, some of the replies were just plain nasty and not okay in ANY context.
TL;DR version: Customer: *complains* Owner: "F... You! We are perfect and you suck!" (or some variation).
"69 Times Restaurants Left Hilarious Replies Under Bad Reviews, Shared By This Instagram Page". These replies are NOT hilarious. Seriously, did you even read them, Rokas?
I couldn't finish reading. Was hoping for funny, well-deserved tell-offs to the customer. Found poorly spelled and worded messes from both sides and unfunny, unprofessional, uncalled for owner responses.
Hey. Don’t bring the mentally challenged into this. The person who liked these sorry retorts is just a garbage person. If you have legitimate bad customers you have legitimate bad customers. Not everyone who complains is automatically an asshole.
Load More Replies... This was soooo painful to read. USE PUNCTUTATIONS AND PROPER GRAMMAR! Both the customer and the company. It's good that I don't have a business that gets customer reviews, because I'd state in the review rules (that no one would read) that your comment/review must be readable/legible. I don't mean a typo of a wrong word is bad. But just... capitals, comma's, stops... Please!
I have never had food delivered to my home as I live 200 yards from a Chinese takeaway and have the option of several places in a radius of a mile. I prefer to order & collect in person(even though that means waiting outside because of COVID-19). I do jobs at McDonalds and was surprised at how many people have the food delivered: IMHO the food at these types of restaurants isn't overly warm to start with and is best eaten within 20 mins of preparation. The majority of the posts dealt with business owners who could not handle criticism and were aggressive/insulting in their replies.
The worst part is that neither customers nor restaurants have no idea how to write a sentence. I think they should do a recap on 2nd grade english, it's ridiculous
Although the majority of the customers come across as whining complainers, even more of the businesses emote unprofessionalism. Their atrocious grammar, punctuation and spelling immediately speaks louder than their often rude and inconsiderate replies. I would be completely embarrassed to have my company represented in this fashion.
So often there are two sides to every story. Boredpanda is irresponsible for printing only one side and asking us to believe that is the whole story.
There’s an undercurrent of micro aggression if the chip shop owners and the customer base are from different classes/ethnicities that is likely going unaddressed. So it could be why the shop owners are so defensive. Some of it could just be bad service though. Since most of it is British I think the race/class thing is heavily in play.
Load More Replies... I'd be leery of most of these places. Just because some mentally challenged individual thought the owners' rude, unprofessional (and ungrammatical) replies were witty or clever doesn't mean the customers' complaints weren't valid.
I also noticed the complete absence of writing skills. I tried reading a couple out loud and I almost had a stroke
Ehhhhh good quality bad quality I just wanna eat something now...
Yes, and people keep using them because they don't WANT to cook most of these things themselves. Some people don't like cooking or aren't good at cooking, and sometimes they just want the convenience of takeout. In some cases it's cheaper to do takeout than to buy the ingredients needed to make it, and there are a lot of people who might not be able to afford the grocery trip.
Load More Replies...