[ImaMichigander]

Dear Original Poster--

I am so sorry that you came here for information and people jumped on you! Isn't this board for questions just like this??? I think back to a very active thread about a particular convenience store in Redford about a year ago. I think the title was "Women of Redford Beware." How is this ANY different? The million to one reference is offensive to me. That's why we are on this site to get information from people out there who might have had the same experience. Why would you jump on someone who was not in anyway obnoxious with her post? She just wondered if there were other people out there. Geez, people, back off!

I have a child with a life threatening allergy-- 1/2 a cashew=anaphalyxis. And by and large, servers and even sometimes manager and chef are VERY willing to help. I once was at a Ben and Jerry's and they opened a whole new tub of ice cream, so there would be no cross contamination from scoops-- their suggestion, not mine. Though there are the times when you ask a cashier or server (and at Starbucks, even Managers) and they answer you and you know they have NO clue what you are talking about.

It would seem to me that this guy has problems. I wonder if a call to the Health Department would help him in understanding the importance of dealing with patrons with allergies. Seems to me that following you out to the parking lot would be overkill in just about ANY situation, but terribly so just over an allergy related request.

So if she'd left out the bit about her child's allergy and just posted something about bad customer service would that have been better folks? Because take out the life threatening situation to her child, and that's what you have here-- really bad customer service. We can talk about that on here, right?

Good luck, original poster! A child with a food allergy is a scary thing!

[magellan]

Originally Posted by ImaMichigander

Dear Original Poster--

I am so sorry that you came here for information and people jumped on you! Isn't this board for questions just like this??? I think back to a very active thread about a particular convenience store in Redford about a year ago. I think the title was "Women of Redford Beware." How is this ANY different? The million to one reference is offensive to me. That's why we are on this site to get information from people out there who might have had the same experience. Why would you jump on someone who was not in anyway obnoxious with her post? She just wondered if there were other people out there. Geez, people, back off!

I have a child with a life threatening allergy-- 1/2 a cashew=anaphalyxis. And by and large, servers and even sometimes manager and chef are VERY willing to help. I once was at a Ben and Jerry's and they opened a whole new tub of ice cream, so there would be no cross contamination from scoops-- their suggestion, not mine. Though there are the times when you ask a cashier or server (and at Starbucks, even Managers) and they answer you and you know they have NO clue what you are talking about.

It would seem to me that this guy has problems. I wonder if a call to the Health Department would help him in understanding the importance of dealing with patrons with allergies. Seems to me that following you out to the parking lot would be overkill in just about ANY situation, but terribly so just over an allergy related request.

So if she'd left out the bit about her child's allergy and just posted something about bad customer service would that have been better folks? Because take out the life threatening situation to her child, and that's what you have here-- really bad customer service. We can talk about that on here, right?

Good luck, original poster! A child with a food allergy is a scary thing!

You can talk about pretty much whatever you'd like on here (as long as you don't troll). And people are welcome to respond to the OP however they'd like, as long as the terms of service of the site aren't violated. Any other questions?

[Greg Anderson]

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Maybe if you post your concerns in a respectful way something will happen on the corporate level. The owner of the Muskegon County Dog N Suds does not care about people. People bother him; he treats his workers like crap and his customers like they grow on trees. In my opinion he could use an attitude adjustment.....aka reality.

[Sparrow_temp]

I hate to sound heartless to the OP but I don't blame the Dog'n'Suds response to you at all. They weren't equipped to deal with weird allergies of people and if they tried to accommodate you and failed -- they'd probably have a very expensive lawsuit headed their way. Your individual sale would have meant inconveniencing others and simply wasn't important to them. Frankly, you're more trouble than you're worth. I think most businesses of that type reserve the right to refuse to serve anybody they choose.

[ImaMichigander]

Originally Posted by Sparrow_temp

I hate to sound heartless to the OP but I don't blame the Dog'n'Suds response to you at all. They weren't equipped to deal with weird allergies of people and if they tried to accommodate you and failed -- they'd probably have a very expensive lawsuit headed their way. Your individual sale would have meant inconveniencing others and simply wasn't important to them. Frankly, you're more trouble than you're worth. I think most businesses of that type reserve the right to refuse to serve anybody they choose.

Wow! With the very real and serious situation of food allergies, that is a very closed minded thought. I'm glad that most people we've encountered don't share your opinions. Predominantly, people have been VERY kind and ready to be helpful. It's not a matter of inconvience, but life or death, for the person with the allergy. Most people would chose to help someone by not giving them food that could cause death, but would cost just a few moments of their time. I hope you never encounter someone with an allergy-- or have someone you love with one.

[snuffybear]

YES! I had the same experience at the Dog & Suds in Montague, Michigan.

In my case, I simply asked the waitress for a substitution of a Plain Bun (which she said they had) for my child's hamburger, instead of the Sesame Seed Bun, as he is allergic to Sesame. The waitress was very nice and professional.

However, the Owner/Manager came out screaming at us that he "doesn't make substitutions for preferences". I explained it's an allergy, not just a prefernce, and this is usually not a problem at other places. He stormed away, came back with the substitution, literally throwing it at me and telling me not to come there if we have allergies, he's been in business 43 yrs, he doesn't need to serve us, etc.

Frankly, I've been dealing with food allergies for 7yrs now, and never been treated like this. Especially when this resturant, because it doesn't serve any nuts, is low risk to my child. The sesame allergy is very easy to accomodate with a simple substitution.

Actually, life threatening food allergies are covered by the ADA and when a simple accomodation is requested, it must be made by law. Most restaurants do exactly that.

My feeling was 1) this guy has an anger problem (he also berated his staff for taking our order -- even though she was great with customers!) and 2) he does not want to serve patrons with allergies, and his whole "come back later" thing is his way of ensuring he doesn't have to serve these customers while staying in the gray area of not outrightly refusing to serve (but, if he turns them away, he really is refusing to serve). 3) He's in the wrong business if he has a panic attack every time someone mentions an allergy, because it is very common and something restaurants deal with every day.

[Sparrow_temp]

The original poster is on a crusade -- google search Maureen and Dogs N Suds. The problem is accommodation -- how easy is it and what are the consequences of failure. If a business doesn't think it can accommodate or doesn't think it's in its best interest to even try -- go somewhere else.

Don't try changing the business because you feel slighted. If every restaurant was forced to eliminate every food that was an allergen from its menu - there wouldn't be much left worth eating. At what point do the rights of the minority trump those of the majority? I'm thinking of the "peanut people" and public schools who want to outlaw all peanut products from the site including peanut butter sandwiches because a student might be deadly allergic to it. It's the same accommodation argument taken to the Nth degree.

Originally Posted by ImaMichigander

Wow! With the very real and serious situation of food allergies, that is a very closed minded thought. I'm glad that most people we've encountered don't share your opinions. Predominantly, people have been VERY kind and ready to be helpful. It's not a matter of inconvience, but life or death, for the person with the allergy. Most people would chose to help someone by not giving them food that could cause death, but would cost just a few moments of their time. I hope you never encounter someone with an allergy-- or have someone you love with one.

[snuffybear]

Life threatening food allergies are easy to accomodate at restaurants and in schools, and the reason the law requires it (ADA and Section 504) is because some people can't simply do the right thing. No one asked the restaurant to ban a food -- they just asked for a simple accomodation (ie, different bun, or to read an ingredient label), which is a standard practice and required by ADA and FDA laws.

Most schools do not ban peanuts either. They are sometimes not allowed in the CLASSROOM when there is a *small child* with a life threatening allergy. This is to ensure the learning environment is not contaminated by something that can cause a life threatening reaction (teachers don't typically have time to be cleaning up sticky peanut butter). However they are almost always allowed in the cafeteria. The reason schools have gone this way is due to the learning from deaths in schools, that could have been prevented had the proper precautions been in place.

The problem with Montague Dog & Suds is the owner. I agree - vote with the dollars. But this is the year 2009 and there are consequences for owners treating customers this way. This is a restaurant in a tiny tourist town -- and he is in a business serving tourists. Food allergies are not going away and he will encounter them in the restaurant business. If he handles them rudely, then perhaps people will post on the internet to warn others, especially given he serves tourists, who sometimes research their trips online. And by the way, the owner seemed like a horrible boss to the really nice kids that work for him. I see at least 3 reports of his horrible behavior on this thread already, both with customers and employees.

[snuffybear]

Originally Posted by Neoabyss

I work at Dog N Suds, Michigan.

We get really busy to dog n suds and people with food allergies are sometimes tough to deal with during busy times. We really don't deny people with food allergies service, or treat them like a pest, all we do is simply ask them to wait until we have some time to talk to them about thier allergy and what we can do to work with them. If you cannot wait a little while until we are less busy then yes, go somewhere else.

Dog & Suds wasn't busy when my family was there (we picked a slow mid-afternoon time on purpose), and we got horrible treatment from the Owner/Manager as well.

I think the "come back when we're less busy" is a line he uses...so that the customer will leave and not come back. I mean, really, if I go to a restaurant, I'm probably hungry now. And since many of the Montague Dog & Suds customers are tourists, he thinks it's no big loss.

Remember though, a customer having a bad experience typically tells 7 people (and that 7 is exponential with the internet). He may have thought we were "just tourists" but in fact we have family there and many friends - all of whom heard about this and in a copule cases, had stories of their own about how this Owner treats customers and employees horribly (and interestingly, only hires cute girls as waitresses...)

[ImaMichigander]

Originally Posted by Sparrow_temp

The original poster is on a crusade -- google search Maureen and Dogs N Suds. The problem is accommodation -- how easy is it and what are the consequences of failure. If a business doesn't think it can accommodate or doesn't think it's in its best interest to even try -- go somewhere else.

Don't try changing the business because you feel slighted. If every restaurant was forced to eliminate every food that was an allergen from its menu - there wouldn't be much left worth eating. At what point do the rights of the minority trump those of the majority? I'm thinking of the "peanut people" and public schools who want to outlaw all peanut products from the site including peanut butter sandwiches because a student might be deadly allergic to it. It's the same accommodation argument taken to the Nth degree.

She's not asking them to change the menu, she's asking for a subsitution or a deletion. If you don't care for curly fries, but they have regular fries on the menu, that's a logical substitution, right? If a person is allergic to sesame seeds and they have a bun without, that's a logical subsitution, right?

My child is allergic to peanuts and treenuts, so when we were just at Cedar Point and the restaurant that makes their products using only peanut oil, we didn't ask them to drain their grease, sanitize, use new oil and then make us some fries, we moved on. Obviously, that would be asking too much. To ask to see packaging, not too much. To ask for a substitution for something they already have on hand, not too much. To ask for something to be left off, not too much.

We chose not to eat in the dining room at Logan's or Texas Roadhouse, because they have peanuts everywhere. We wouldn't think of asking them to change. But kids have to go to school, so if there is a child who is allergic to the airborn particles of peanuts, and it could kill the kid, I think asking for no nuts in the room is a pretty reasonable request.

We had no idea our child had a nut allergy until she ingested the first one, by accident. It certainly isn't something we asked for, wanted or expected. But it's what we got. So if I can do anything to safe guard her, I will. And I wish that people who can help, will make the right choice to help too.