Chicago, IL – On a Rowdy Tuesday Evening at Ed Debevic’s, a woman appropriately named Karen managed to make the entire staff cry with her incessant demands and entitled attitude. Witnesses say that Karen, a self-proclaimed “foodie” with a Yelp account, arrived at the diner with an air of superiority and immediately began berating the servers for not providing her with a gluten-free menu.
“She just kept yelling ‘I need a gluten-free menu!’ over and over again,” said one server, who asked to remain anonymous. “We tried to explain to her that we don’t have one, but she just wouldn’t listen. And then she started asking for substitutions and modifications that were just impossible to accommodate.”
As the night wore on, Karen continued to belittle the servers and demand special treatment. By the end of the meal, the entire staff was in tears and the restaurant was in chaos.
“It was like nothing we’d ever seen before,” said the owner of Ed Debevic’s, who also asked to remain anonymous. “We had to close the restaurant for a week to retrain the staff on how to out-sass the modern-day Karens of the world. It was a wake-up call for all of us.”
During the week-long closure, the staff underwent rigorous training in how to deal with entitled customers and maintain their trademark sassy attitude. The owner even hired a consultant who specializes in dealing with difficult customers to help train the staff.
“We’re taking this very seriously,” the owner said. “We don’t want to be known as a restaurant that can’t handle a Karen. We’re going to come back stronger than ever and ready to take on any entitled customer that walks through our doors.”
As for Karen, she has reportedly been banned from Ed Debevic’s for life. The staff is hoping that their retraining will equip them with the tools to deal with any future Karens that may come their way.