A Lynchburg, Virginia, restaurant went on a rant on their Facebook page this week when a teen paid for his bill in quarters.
Change is inevitable, and that message now has more than a few meanings for the Lynchburg restaurant, Beer 88. The restaurant has since taken down their Facebook page after facing public outrage from a nasty shame-fest they posted. The post belittled a teen patron who had paid for his lunch tab partially in quarters.
The post featured a picture of the teen's money with the caption, "How NOT to pay at a restaurant."
Courtesy The Quarter Boy's Facebook Page
Cohen Naulty, the 17-year-old who had paid his $45 restaurant bill and left a $10 tip (that's over 20 percent) with a $20 bill and quarters, took a screenshot of the post before it was taken down.
(I have to throw my two "cents" in here and say I worked as a cocktail waitress for many years. I would have been grateful to ANYONE tipping me over 20 percent, even if they'd tipped me in Japanese yen).
Naulty told local station WSET he was at the restaurant because he wanted to take the tips he earned as a server at Country Kitchen and treat his friends to lunch. His friends, too, were shocked to learn that the payment method had been shamed on Facebook.
Beer 88 responded to their Facebook followers' criticism with a statement, which has also been removed. ABC News reported:
“In response to our earlier post, it was posted as a joke, intended as a joke and should be taken as a joke," Beer 88 wrote. "It was posted as a light-hearted way of saying that something like this can be annoying to people that work in the restaurant/retail industry. In no way did we publicly shame ANYONE for paying OR tipping. We try to keep our page funny and relatable. And had no idea that this would be offensive to anyone.”
Cohen and his family did not find anything funny or relatable about the words that were used.
“If anybody met Cohen, they know [having no home training] couldn’t be farthest things from the truth," Kim Naulty, Cohen’s mother, told WSET. "And, you know, he’s a good kid.”
Proving that point, Cohen has started a Facebook page called, The Quarter Boy, in which he's accepting donations, turning them into quarters, and using the quarters to buy lunch for random people at restaurants that have no quarter-snobbery.
Courtesy, The Quarter Kid's Facebook Page
“We will post videos so that you can see too how big a change just a little ‘change’ can make,” Cohen wrote of his new initiative.
Make it RAIN, Cohen!
What do YOU think about Beer 88's currency-shaming? Hold nothing back in our comments section!
