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?
The least the customer could’ve done was put their outside lights on, tell him what the house looks like, tell him what kind of car is parked out front, or look out for the driver and flag him down to be sure he could find them. I mean, ffs, give the guy some help, instead of making him burn gas trying to deliver your food, if you know your house is hard to find!
This seems like misunderstanding. If replier is Indian, an not familiar with different dietary options, there are high chances they consider milk products to be veg option. Back in the days India only followed two dietary options Veg and Non Veg. Veg = Vegetables and milk products; Non Veg = Eggs, meat, fish. May be follow up request to omit cream may get you more accurate answer as if they can fulfill your request or not.
ok first off, thats just messed up. you order at two am and expect it to be god quality?
OK, I was hoping for some witty snappy comments, but they're just rude replies...
This is a problem with all online ratings. Competitors and disgruntled ex-employees can trash a business’ reputation online, in an effort to steal customers or just for pure spite. Instead of being petty, just work harder and better, and/or sell a better product.
Makes you wonder which kind of “coke” they were expecting with their order, doesn’t it?
Maybe there ought to be a separate ranking option for delivery? I probably would have added the comment about delivery as a "PS".
Yeah, as an ex courier amongst other jobs, I get this .... sometimes addresses are bloody impossible to find - one for instance was a woman who's house was off the main road, down a dirt track, then down another - gated - dirt track, up a badly rutted track (so bad, that I thought my exhaust was going to go), finally got there - an hour after leavibg the bloody main road - all to deliver a bar of fcking soap !!
So the chips were still frozen because your driver got pulled over? Gotcha.
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...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...