Two North Carolina Smoothie King locations were temporarily closed after two customers experienced racism from employees.
The stores were closed after two customers were called racist names on their receipts, according to The Charlotte Observer.
Calvin Caldwell claims a cashier wrote the n-word on his receipt instead of asking for his name when he placed an order on Sunday.
"I thought it was very disrespectful. I thought it was very rude,” he told WSOC-TV. “Especially since I'm a paying customer, and I'm a loyal customer because I come to Smoothie King often. I thought it was in bad taste and completely inappropriate to use that kind of language."
Kenneth Choi, who is Korean, had an similar experience at a different location. Instead of typing his name, an employee identified as Zach H. wrote “Jackie Chan.”
He shared his outrage with Facebook.
“I was just in this Smoothie King with my kids. Instead of asking for my name. Zack H. thought it would be funny to put ‘Jackie Chan’ as my name,” he wrote. “Being Korean, I find this very insulting. But the 3 employees working there at the time couldn't stop laughing about it. I experience racism here and there and usually doesn't bother me. Today I left this store furious on the inside, trying to not let my young kids know what just happened.”
Smoothie King CEO Wan Kim released a statement to apologize for the employees’ actions. He also confirmed the status of their employment and the company’s plans to rectify the situation.
Kim wrote:
"Today, two instances happened in our Charlotte franchise stores that are totally unacceptable and go against every value that we stand for. Two of our team members wrote inappropriate, racial remarks about our guests. We have zero tolerance for any action where a guest is disrespected, and we have taken immediate and decisive action. As of tonight, both team members involved have been terminated. Both stores will be closed until the franchisees and their respective teams complete further training on our standards and to ensure that nothing like this occurs again. Additionally, we are continuing our investigation to insure that any individuals involved in these situations have been terminated. This behavior does not in any way reflect our company’s commitment to creating an open and welcoming environment, and for that we sincerely apologize. Our senior management team is taking additional steps to reinforce and retrain all of our franchisee and store-level employees of our inclusivity policies and best practices."
