Sandwich Chain CEO Apologizes For Christmas Firing
It's incredibly poor form to fire someone via email. It's even worse form to do it via a mass email. It's even worse to do it a couple days before Christmas. But that's exactly what happened to the staff of one of the locations of Snarf's Sandwiches in Chicago last weekend, when the company sent out an email informing all the shop's employees that Monday, December 23rd would be their last day, as the shop was shutting down.
The backlash was brutal, as the firings made national news. While there's nothing that the chain can do to really set things right, CEO Jim Seidel has apologized via this message on the chain's Facebook page:
"I am very remorseful for the way we handled our recent restaurant closure at 600 West in Chicago. It was insensitive and poorly planned. By explanation, rather than excuse, business was suffering and we felt the need to act quickly to begin efforts to re-concept the store. We recognize now we acted rashly. For this, we apologize to our employees and to our loyal customers who we know we've disappointed. This was not handled in a way that met our own standards for quality and kindness. We've learned from this mistake and will not be so insensitive again. For now, as a token of our apology and in the holiday spirit, we will be providing impacted employees an additional week of wages. Again, we are deeply sorry. –Jim Seidel, CEO/Owner, Snarf's"
All things considered, this was a pretty classy way to handle a very messy situation.