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Rain Temple posted:Ah yeah, that's what I was just thinking after I posted that - I can't imagine kids getting anything out of it either. I guess places like that only get new customers and not repeat customers. I can't see anyone walking into a place that did that if they actually advertised the fact either, I guess that's what I'm trying to say. It just seems like a feature that's specifically designed to detract business. Then again, so do a lot of the things in the Dumb Moves In Marketing thread, granted. I think the problem is that some parents think that their kids want it, even if the kids secretly hate it, since that was the case for me. When I was young, my parents would always take me to some place where they sang for your birthday and I hated it. I told them later on that I hated it and they acted really surprised and confused, and it came out eventually that they didn't even like it, but they thought I did.
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Mar 26, 2015 14:29
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Adults often think that other adults want this too, or enjoy embarrassing them. I'd take birthday songs every night over the lame mariachi guy/band in every Mexican restaurant who shows up to your table uninvited.
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Mar 26, 2015 14:51
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Rain Temple posted:I always figured Starbucks in America must do their coffee totally differently from the way the Starbucks here do theirs since I've seen folk on SA in the past saying they'd take a Starbucks coffee over a McDonalds coffee, given the choice. This is a bit like saying you'd rather drink a glass of piss than eat a poo poo sandwich. Starbucks isn't good in the US either, but McD's coffee is its own special level of terrible.
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Mar 26, 2015 14:58
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Henchman of Santa posted:Adults often think that other adults want this too, or enjoy embarrassing them.
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Mar 26, 2015 15:37
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You dumb fucks. Getting servers to sing to kids on their birthday is about embarrassing the poo poo out of the kid and it's one of the perks of being a parent.
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Mar 26, 2015 15:55
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Rain Temple posted:Also the singing and dancing thing is blowing my mind. Even if it's just children's restaurants, how do parents not cringe and feel uncomfortable and awkward the whole time? How do these places ever get any customers if they do that poo poo? Then again, I'm an uptight Brit, so I like the the idea of a smile and even a bit of banter from staff, but the idea of trying to eat a meal where someone is dancing or ordering ice-cream where the server is singing makes my skin want to slide right off my body. It's Fun(tm)! Marketing studies show that people who choose TGI-Bullshits over nearby Pappy O'Shittigans are looking for a relaxing good time (tm) with their friends and a Fun (tm) atmosphere accentuated by the systematic degradation (tm) of our employees' dignity.
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Mar 26, 2015 15:57
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walrusman posted:It's Fun(tm)! Marketing studies show that people who choose TGI-Bullshits over nearby Pappy O'Shittigans are looking for a relaxing good time (tm) with their friends and a Fun (tm) atmosphere accentuated by the systematic degradation (tm) of our employees' dignity. Bona Festa! What a joyous day! Life's good fortune Is sure to come your way! Come on, sit back, and just relax Time to enjoy your special day! We're so glad you came to celebrate With us today! Hey! (Olive Garden's old song, I was a server there 10 years ago) At all of the restaurants I've waited tables at, they all had their own lovely song because singing Happy Birthday requires royalties. So pay a low fee for some schmuck to generate a crappy tune. Additionally, whenever you had a birthday at your table and needed to round up fellow servers to sing with you, it was a loving ghost town. You had to stand there and beg people. At Olive Garden we were supposed to have at least 5 people come to the table to sing with you while Grandma looks really uncomfortable and the chubby grandson keeps staring at the cake that you're holding and dad won't stop taking photos of everyone. When you're here, you're family!
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Mar 26, 2015 16:14
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The Saddest Rhino posted:lol how big a child are you I am literally giant baby. Seriously, though, I don't mind noise at all if I'm in a place where it is appropriate. You don't bring screaming children into restaurants that don't have a slide or a ball-pit, and I find it similarly intrusive to suddenly have a bunch of people yelling at the top of their lungs while I'm eating a steak. It's not the end of the world or anything, but I think it's pretty stupid, that's all. I don't really lose any sleep over it or anything, but you know, internet hyperbole. Tiggum posted:Every restaurant? Do you only go to child-friendly chains or is this actually something that real restaurants are doing? Pretty much every chain restaurant. Obviously not fine dining establishments with $50 pasta dishes and $80 steaks, but any place that average people go on an average week.
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Mar 26, 2015 16:19
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There's a dirt cheap Mexican place in Milwaukee (Conejitos), and the last time I was there they did the birthday song and dance. They literally turned off all the lights in the dining room and blared a song through the speakers for literally at least 4 or 5 minutes. It was weird, and people just wanted the lights back on so they could eat.
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Mar 26, 2015 17:26
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Mouse Dresser posted:At all of the restaurants I've waited tables at, they all had their own lovely song because singing Happy Birthday requires royalties. So pay a low fee for some schmuck to generate a crappy tune. There was some big chain I was at a few months back (hell if can remember which one...Cheesecake Factory maybe?) that actually sang Happy Birthday to someone. It blew my mind.
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Mar 26, 2015 17:51
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mamelon posted:I'm guessing from context that Joe's doesn't actually offer crab? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1lNjlGgzQE
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Mar 26, 2015 18:16
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http://metro.co.uk/2015/03/26/are-you-lovin-it-the-first-official-mcdonalds-clothing-and-homeware-collection-has-landed-5121192/ quote:You might be tempted to think this is a wind-up, all the products are available to buy online at the Big Mac shop. imlovingit24 didn't really go down well. http://gothamist.com/2015/03/24/ol_gil_mcdonald_gets_a_lick.php quote:The United States was only #blessed with one event: a free concert in Los Angeles tonight with recording artist Ne-Yo, who'll be debuting a new song "crowdsourced" by people on social media. If it's one thing America needed to attain joy, it's the rhetoric of internet trolls set to music. It could be worse: in Sweden, the national ski team was compelled to put on a three-hour fashion show wearing gear emblazoned with Big Macs. "I'm lovin" how disgusted those models look.
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Mar 26, 2015 18:21
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For once they have diarrhea on the outside of their clothes
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Mar 26, 2015 18:29
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I get it at kids' places to sing and dance, and yeah, its about embarrassing the kids. But who thinks its a good idea? Who is like "Alright, lets all interrupt our work day to sing to these guys and possibly LOSE more of a tip due to the delay!" Its like the lettuce under a steak or door hanger advertising, or gag ties. Literally no one wants that poo poo, yet collectively we as a society, still don't stop doing it.
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Mar 26, 2015 19:32
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Jastiger posted:I get it at kids' places to sing and dance, and yeah, its about embarrassing the kids. But who thinks its a good idea? Who is like "Alright, lets all interrupt our work day to sing to these guys and possibly LOSE more of a tip due to the delay!" My mom and aunts go nuts over this poo poo. Tacky, sentimental poo poo is nourishment for old white ladies. Case in point, they're the only people I've ever met who don't find Christmas carolers awkward and annoying.
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Mar 26, 2015 19:43
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I always thought that the embarrassing song was the price some people were willing to pay for the free piece of cake/scoop of ice cream/sopapilla/whatever some restaurants give you if they find out it's your birthday.
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Mar 26, 2015 19:44
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I was out getting yakiniku with a friend at the local Gyu-kaku and there was a birthday song there. At a yakiniku place. With rhythmic clapping. 
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Mar 26, 2015 21:16
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Jastiger posted:I get it at kids' places to sing and dance, and yeah, its about embarrassing the kids. But who thinks its a good idea? Who is like "Alright, lets all interrupt our work day to sing to these guys and possibly LOSE more of a tip due to the delay!" Yes, that is precisely what the servers say, because as the ones doing the singing the servers obviously enjoy it and must be the ones who chose for singing to be a thing
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Mar 26, 2015 21:17
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FutonForensic posted:They don't. They cringe and feel uncomfortable and awkward the whole time. When I was a kid and I was misbehaving at a restaurant my mom would threaten to tell the server that it was my birthday. That got me to straighten my act pretty quick.  kazil posted:You dumb fucks. Getting servers to sing to kids on their birthday is about embarrassing the poo poo out of the kid and it's one of the perks of being a parent. A parent who doesn't do the singing and dancing to embarrass their kids themselves is a shameful parent.
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Mar 26, 2015 22:22
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I used to travel a ton with the same group of coworkers and you didn't ever dare to leave your seat at dinner lest you return to a slice of cake and a bunch of singing.
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Mar 26, 2015 22:26
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Dangit Ronpaul posted:This is a bit like saying you'd rather drink a glass of piss than eat a poo poo sandwich. Starbucks isn't good in the US either, but McD's coffee is its own special level of terrible. It's not like saying that at all though. McDonalds coffee in the UK (as far as I've experienced it or anyone I know has) tastes just like regular coffee-machine coffee. Not posh coffee shop quality, but perfectly decent vending machine coffee. Starbucks, on the other hand, is almost undrinkable. Hence my theory that McD's coffee is made differently in the US for whatever reason that might be. I'm sure someone else from the UK will post that they've tried McDonalds coffee here too and it's poo poo and then we'll know my theory is a load of bollocks and I've just got no discerning taste.
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Mar 26, 2015 23:11
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Rain Temple posted:It's not like saying that at all though. McDonalds coffee in the UK (as far as I've experienced it or anyone I know has) tastes just like regular coffee-machine coffee. Not posh coffee shop quality, but perfectly decent vending machine coffee. Starbucks, on the other hand, is almost undrinkable. Hence my theory that McD's coffee is made differently in the US for whatever reason that might be. I'm sure someone else from the UK will post that they've tried McDonalds coffee here too and it's poo poo and then we'll know my theory is a load of bollocks and I've just got no discerning taste. I'm not a coffee professional or anything and I will drink a lot of lovely, flavourless crap if it's hot and has caffeine, but McD black coffee is pretty decent and has saved my butt on multiple road trips. Their mocha sucks though. I love those Costa vending machines you get in petrol stations these days. Nothing like being able to get a pint of black coffee every fifty miles of a tour. Being able to guarantee that it's fresh and identical to the one you had an hour ago is just a bonus.
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Mar 27, 2015 00:07
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Trent posted:Pretty much every chain restaurant. Obviously not fine dining establishments with $50 pasta dishes and $80 steaks, but any place that average people go on an average week. Are there no normal restaurants where you live? Is it a choice between Pizza Hut and paying $60?
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Mar 27, 2015 05:02
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Tiggum posted:Are there no normal restaurants where you live? Is it a choice between Pizza Hut and paying $60? In my experience, choosing between awfully kitschy chain restaurants and legitimate businesses trying to make good food is difficult. Maybe there's some magical places in America where the two don't compete, but I haven't been there. Obviously the dude was joking a little about the prices, though.
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Mar 27, 2015 05:31
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Go to Red Lobster and spend $35 on some lobster out of the microwave.
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Mar 27, 2015 05:36
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Tiggum posted:Are there no normal restaurants where you live? Is it a choice between Pizza Hut and paying $60? Honestly in many places in america with a pop of under ~25k this is a real issue. Your choice is between Chili's, Subway and a terrible place that is only still in business because sometimes people get really tired of the Subway and decide to spend two dollars more at that place where the police chiefs DUI-happy daughter desperately tries to make some terrible hoagie she saw Rachel Ray make one time when she was waiting to get patched up in the ER a town over.
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Mar 27, 2015 14:52
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Small town america sounds like hell.
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Mar 27, 2015 15:17
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PhazonLink posted:Small town america sounds like hell. It does also depend on the small town. Where I live there are a lot of little towns with jack poo poo to do but they've all got at least one mom and pop place within 30 minutes drive (which around here is nothing) that serves decent, if simple, food for fairly cheap.
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Mar 27, 2015 15:34
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Huntersoninski posted:It does also depend on the small town. Where I live there are a lot of little towns with jack poo poo to do but they've all got at least one mom and pop place within 30 minutes drive (which around here is nothing) that serves decent, if simple, food for fairly cheap. And it can be the reverse in some suburbs, where the only choices you have are chain restaurants or $60 and up a head (or the crappy hot dog shack across the railroad tracks that has gotten overpriced as it has gotten popular), and where a 30 minute drive either means you're in another county or in the commercial cluster of chains depending on the day's (or hour's) traffic patterns.
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Mar 27, 2015 15:47
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And every single town off the freeways will have at least one mom and pop greasy spoon diner, that will make you contemplate on existence as you ponder how they managed to make toast in bacon grease. They won't even ask you if you want coffee, because you want coffee. I've never been anywhere in middle America that had a chain place that didn't have twice as many mom and pops. It's almost always comfort food, but whats better when you are on the road then comfort food? Something that doesn't cause gastronomic distress? pshaw.
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Mar 27, 2015 15:51
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Having to drive half an hour to get anything sounds terrible.
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Mar 27, 2015 15:56
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Chas McGill posted:Having to drive half an hour to get anything sounds terrible. Well I did say within 30 minutes, and it depends on what you want. If you want a chain or just whatever your town has, there's no reason to drive that long. Like, in my home town the best non-chains were a diner and a pizza place. Don't want that, drive 15 minutes to the next town over, they have a good italian place and a cafe with soups and sandwiches. No? Another 10 minutes will get you to a different place. It's all straight shots of flat, decent road, so it goes quickly. I can think of a few towns that had literally nothing, but they're usually less than 20 minutes from something, which, again, depending on where you live could be a problem or it could be no big deal. Those towns do suck tho
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Mar 27, 2015 16:01
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Lap-Lem posted:I've never been anywhere in middle America that had a chain place that didn't have twice as many mom and pops. You're thinking about actual towns, not just lovely exurbs with oversized cardboard houses for people to park their oversized SUVs that they commute on the oversized roads with.
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Mar 27, 2015 16:36
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Lap-Lem posted:And every single town off the freeways will have at least one mom and pop greasy spoon diner, that will make you contemplate on existence as you ponder how they managed to make toast in bacon grease. They won't even ask you if you want coffee, because you want coffee. My last job involved a LOT of travel to small towns in northern NY and New England, and most of these "mom and pop" places have the worst God damned food...I'd usually rather go to a loving Applebee's or Chili's if there was one (often there wasn't, because these are seriously tiny towns.) Bland and muishy is the name of the game, which is why it makes sense that most of their clientele are senior citizens who can gum down the food and not have it upset their digestion. I'm not saying that I need some gourmet, artisinal burger that costs $35, but I'd also rather it not be literally the exact same un-salted, un-seasoned Sysco-brand frozen patty I was served in my high school cafeteria...with the exact same disgusting, soggy*, crinkle-cut fries, to boot. *Soggy except for that one fry that is so overcooked it's basically a fry-shaped rock.
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Mar 27, 2015 16:46
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Yeah for every good local place there's at least ten like that - and unfortunately the trick is living in the area til you figure it out. Like, in the cluster of small towns where I grew up there were probably four or five actually good locally owned places and probably over a dozen really lovely ones that were constantly closing/reopening as something else/closing/reopening/etc. And if you weren't from the area you'd have no idea. E: to be fair though, for being boring and tiny there were some nearby-ish tourist events so there would be some decent stuff to keep people coming through.
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Mar 27, 2015 17:00
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Mar 27, 2015 17:04
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Tiggum posted:Are there no normal restaurants where you live? Is it a choice between Pizza Hut and paying $60? I live in a town of 200,000 and the closest place I can think of that doesn't pose the possibility of a birthday song, but also isn't fast food, is the $40/steak place about fifteen minutes away. There really is no middle ground sometimes. The first place I can think of that is reasonable food, but not a chain, is 20 minutes as long as there is literally no traffic. Otherwise I'm looking at 30 minutes minimum, and the backs of a lot of lovely SUVs Welcome to America, this poo poo is real and it is terrible.
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Mar 27, 2015 17:06
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Oh man
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Mar 27, 2015 17:08
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Maybe your town just sucks? In my area there's a polish pasty shop that does it all hand made that's open 11-7, a chinese place that's super tiny and has dirt cheap, good food and 50 cent cans of soda, and a all organic taco joint that's packed out to the street at lunch. That's not counting the local pizza joint. I work third shift, but on my days off, its a challenge to pick what i wanna eat sometimes that's like, 10 minutes away.
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Mar 27, 2015 17:28
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I honestly thought I was in the First World Problems thread until I reached the bottom of the page and saw the title again
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Mar 27, 2015 17:32
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