I am usually loathed to call out businesses for bad behaviour on social media. I much prefer to settle conflicts amicably between the parties without having to resort to a public flogging. When we can work together to remedy a problem, it serves us well going forward and everybody wins. But, there are times when the business practices and behaviour are just so loathsome that they need to be exposed for the crookedness that they are. This is one of those times. The story is below but if you want the TL;DR version, here it is: My Zaidy's Bakery at Bathurst and Steeles ripped off a group of teenagers who were doing a Chanukah fundraiser.
Here's the story.
My Zaidy's Bakery in Thornhill is the go-to place to purchase sufganiyot for Chanukah. They are simply the best and there is no denying the exceptional quality of their product. Every Jew I know who lives in the North Jewish Ghetto gets their sufganiyot from My Zaidy's. They have been written up in local papers and have consistently topped blog sites for the absolute excellence of their filled donuts. I say this as somebody who doesn't particularly like donuts or sufganiyot but even I can recognize virtuosity when I see it.
My daughter-in-law is a director of youth and family programming at a local synagogue. The teens with whom she works planned to do a fundraiser this Chanukah to raise a few dollars to renovate their badly outdated youth lounge. The kids were putting together Chanukah-themed baskets filled with all sorts of goodies, to be delivered to houses across the city this weekend. The kids pre-sold the baskets with the promise of many treats, including sufganiyot. My daughter-in-law first spoke to My Zaidy's back in November about bulk pricing for the donuts. She was quoted a price of $1.60/per donut and was told that she could place her order up until two days before pickup. The deadline for purchasing the baskets was this past Monday and it was then and only then, that my daughter-in-law could place the order for the donuts because she needed firm numbers. She had a Facebook Messenger conversation with somebody who works at My Zaidy's on Monday, during which the price of $1.60/per donut was affirmed. The person that she spoke with told her that this was their best price and that the deadline for putting in the large order of 43 half dozen boxes (258 sufganiyot in total) was the following day, Tuesday, otherwise, the donuts wouldn't be ready for Friday to put them in the baskets. She even double-checked on Monday evening that it was ok to place the order on Tuesday morning. The entire conversation is time-stamped and recorded in writing on Messenger.
She called the next day, Tuesday to place the order and was told that she was now too late to order and the woman acted as if the entire conversation the previous day hadn't occurred. When my daughter-in-law showed them the recorded conversation, they acted like they were doing her a favour, were incredibly rude to her, and hiked the price to $2.25/per donut. They claimed that they had no recollection of the previous conversation about the price, EVEN when confronted with the evidence from Messenger. They made an excuse that the new cost was now because they had to box the pastries. Were they expecting her to carry 258 donuts out to her car in her hands? As she was under time pressure and without other options for promised sufganiyot to be included in the baskets, she agreed to the extra cost even though it was going to gut the profits the kids were hoping to make for their project. She placed the order to be picked up Friday morning. Concerned about the entire affair, she put in a follow-up call on Thursday afternoon to confirm the order and the pick-up for the following day. She was told that all was good and not to worry.
Yesterday, she trekked up to Thornhill to retrieve the donuts. They told her that they "forgot" about the order and that they didn't have them. She was absolutely furious. It is her guess that they sold the donuts out from under her and expected her to just deal with it. You need to know My Son's B'shert to understand that she wasn't having any of that bullshit. She demanded her order. The owner asked her to come back on Saturday evening to retrieve the order but since the basket deliveries were happening on Saturday afternoon, that solution was a non-starter. They asked her to return later in the afternoon and they promised her the original price of $1.60/per to make up for the hassle. She was incredibly upset about having to make the trip twice and, when she made that known, the person at the bakery asked her where she lived. She told him and he responded, "That's not a Jewish area. Did your goy boyfriend make you move there?"
Now she was being ripped-off and insulted?
She returned to the bakery just before Shabbat. At that time, the manager told her that there was no way could they honour the $1.60/per piece that was just re-promised her in the morning, and that she would have to pay the extra costs after all. He tried to make it up with extra donuts but she was insistent that the money was far more important. It was for the kids and their fundraiser. He even started loading the extra donuts into her car even though she told him that her numbers were fixed and that she had nowhere to give out the extras. He said that the extra boxes would make up for the money he owed her. When she explained that this was akin to stealing from kids, he told her that he would make a donation but that she would have to come back next week after Chanukah to collect it. She isn't holding her breath and certainly doesn't expect him to make good on the "promise".
According to their Facebook page reviews, this isn't the first time My Zaidy's Bakery has screwed around with pre-ordered and pre-paid customers. That kind of behaviour simply isn't cool.
I understand that everybody is suffering right now and that small businesses are bearing an unfair load but that is no excuse for bad business practices or behaviour. My daughter-in-law went out of her way to patronize small local businesses for this project to help them out in this time of struggle. She was met with nothing but kindness from most of the local merchants she dealt with, many of whom donated for the cause out of their meagre profits, and for that she and her youth group are most grateful. At no time did she expect or even ask My Zaidy's to donate the donuts, rather she expected them to just honour their commitment.
Those who read this space regularly know that I rarely name names. I prefer the subtleness of anonymity but there are times when it is necessary to call a gonif a gonif. This story irritated me beyond belief and I will be reticent to patronize My Zaidy's Bakery in the future because of it. Good sufganiyot simply aren't worth sacrificing my moral code.
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