Hello? Hello. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of the Backyard Barbecue Podcast. I am your host, Eric Cooper Breeze. Hello everybody. Hope you've been having a good day wherever you might be at in the world. Thank everybody for listening and tuning it in. See you guys have been sharing. Somehow some way. The numbers for the podcast has been growing up and I just wanna say that I appreciate you all's support. If you want to share it to your friends and family feel, please feel free to do so. If they don't have the same type of platform that you have, then you can share with them through Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Spotify, iHeart Music Radio to name a few. So I'll just hop right on into it. One of the reasons that I am very transparent with myself, my background things that I have done in day-to-day life is because when you start speaking truth to people, a lot of times you get attacked. And so my aim is always to be able to put my own business out into the street rather than somebody attempting to do it for me. And so, with that I always aim to hold myself accountable before I can hold someone else accountable, and I don't have a problem with people, giving me constructive criticism. In fact, I encourage it, especially on this show. Maybe it's some things that one of your other favorite podcasters do that you feel like I, I can incorporate or just. Anything, we all should be open to receiving constructive criticism, even if it's not constructive. And it's just playing out criticism, because people are entitled to that. I think that within our community, the black community, we get a little sensitive when it comes to people giving us their feedback. Feedback is good, it teaches you how to. Move forward. And if you're a business person, which is what we'll be talking about today, if you're a business person, a lot of times you're gonna get some, a lot of things that people tell you that you need to do. I wish you did this, I wish you had that. If you just only had this, I'll come all the time. Or blah, blah, blah, blah. You learn to kind of separate. D two. When you are a business and you offer services to people, as the business that my wife and I cater to, we receive a lot of, can you all do this? I would like to see this, I would like to see that, or, I wasn't happy with this. I wasn't happy with that, and some of it is just complaining, we have been. And business for nine years and have done enough business to know when it's just somebody that's just complaining or someone that has actually had a problem. However, even if we feel like it's a situation where somebody is complaining, we still listen and hear that complaint out. And not only do we listen to hear it out, but we also put ourselves in a position to try to. Address that person's complaints to the best of our ability, and not so much for them, but for us, because we live in a world of social media we don't feel like we have to kiss nobody's ass, but hey, your reputation could be up one minute down the next, but as a business owner, you do know. Depending on what your field is, what's appropriate concerns and the type of service that you give people, more importantly and you know when the service is not that good and you know when it has been. And so when you receive these complaints or cri criticism, then you have to move accordingly. So that brings us to what I wanted to talk about today. I was, On social media and came across this post about a a couple that had just got married I believe it was the week before last. Ernest Jackson. Congratulations to you. Ernest, if anybody knows Ernest, hey. Give him a shout out and his wife, Shaira Jackson, congratulations on your nuptials. I hope you all have a long lasting marriage full of, much joy and happiness. I'm always glad to see two black people joining together and forming a bond that is not supposed to be broken by anything as I was reading. About his wedding. I came across a few pictures that the, I'm not sure who posted it, who ca who had the original post. I believe it was his mother-in-law who shared the original post. But at, in looking at his page, I also saw him. So him being the groom I'm gonna address, you know what he said. So, Mr. Jackson said that my wedding was almost perfect. We chose the wrong catering for food from someone who can cook soul food. This was the worst food that I've ever tried to eat as the groom. Of course, we ate first I looked at the chicken and said, okay, the chicken is cooked and old grease, and the bait chicken is dry with no seasoning. W two wtf. For those of you who don't know what that is, this is what the fuck did my new mother-in-law pay for. She was highly upset and nearly$4,000 and four, nearly$4,000. I don't blame her. The matter was not handled properly. Instead of making this right, the owner the owner blocked them and. I'm sorry, one second. Okay. The matter was not handled properly. Instead of making it right, the owner blocked a complaining customer who only got excuses and admitted the chicken was dry. So why serve it at a venue? No refund of any kind was offered by the owner, nor was that. Was there answer via email? The matter will have to be handled through civil court. This is so. This is so sad. Another black owned business comes up short with a black client. I bet if we were a different shade, they would have done things differently. But hey, this is a perfect example of why black customers do not do business with black owned businesses. Now I also, I'm a fair person, so I. I also read the reviews. The catering company is called Wow Catering. Like, wow you brought me that. Wow. Or Wow, that was good. But in this case it was, wow you brought that here for us to eat. And so the gentleman that's the owner He put up a post as well, he said in response to what was posted on Facebook today to campaign for people who have never eaten my food, to send negative comments and reviews my company's way. I have this to say, this day and era, we understand how social media works. One person runs to their posts. To post their unsatisfactory opinions of something and regardless of how true or inaccurate the accusations are, the followers all follow. That said, my reputation of good food and customer service always comes first. I aim to please every customer, every time we understand. Sometimes you do fall short and cannot please all, and you also cannot talk to some of y'all. I have had their food prepared and ready by two o'clock. I apologize for the chicken maybe being a little dry after four hours of sitting on shaving dishes, but as for my good. But as far as my taste goes, voted best overall minority restaurant, three years in a row. Everyone's taste buds are not the same. I'm sorry. I've rented a service and the food was eaten and there was no refund. Only other words I have for those indulging in the mess. Wait until you see what's coming next. To my Wild Catering, llc, family and supporters, love all. Can't wait to see and cook for you all. Now, I was laughing at the bar where it says everyone's taste buds are not the same because like I always tell y'all I'm nobody's racist, but there are some, some things that I'm gonna say that's Are more catered to the black community and some that might be more catered to the white community in this case. This is a black guy and the couple, they were also black. Now, again, like I said, I did my due diligence on this topic. I went and I I did a little research on the company, He did have some five, five star reviews. Now there were only maybe about three or four that were reviewed, they were five stars. Now what I did wind up coming across which this was just recently, was another gentleman and he had something to say that. Was kind of like the same thing. So he said never really had an issue with the restaurant, just the catering Chef D'Angelo promised the world to my wife and I. That's another wedding situation. Our wedding was October 15th, 2022. We hired D'Angelo and his wife were plated dinner and stuffed chicken, breasts sized fruit and dips. We placed our deposit. After months of trying to communicate with Chef D'Angelo to pay the rest of what we owed, he finally responded like he didn't know who we were. This is the same man that told my wife and I that we are now quote unquote, family. The day of the wedding he sent a server and two people I had never met. He nor his wife bothered to show. The dips were fine, the fruit was good, and the rest of the. But the rest was mediocre and downright awful. The chicken barely had any stuffing flavor, and most of it. Lights, saw dust in your mouth. I wasn't happy with this at all. I tried to call Chef D'Angelo several times over the next few days, but he never answered nor returned a call. I decided to let it go. Let's fast forward to May 11th. I come across a post on Facebook of Wow, calling out a client who wasn't happy with her service. After a bit of research, I see that her and her husband had a very similar experience. They attempted to speak with DeAngelo, but when they pressured him, he blocked them. I shared my experience on Facebook. I shared my experience on the Facebook post as well, just to have one of his servers make up lies about our experience. She said, we raved about the food, quote unquote, we did not. D'Angelo was there, not a singles person saw him, but the server saw him. I guess, and that we returned a week later for a dinner, quote unquote. No, we didn't. We never came back. D'Angelo blocked me as well, and then his server proceeded to call me a coward on Facebook. Completely un unprofessional. And in every regard, one recommended this to my worst enemy. So it seems like, while catering is. Or the restaurant. Maybe the restaurant has better food. I don't know. Just as a fair fairness, I did look at the pictures of the menu and that's why I was laughing earlier when he said that everybody has different taste buds. Because I looked at all of those. I think there was about 12 pictures on Yelp. Food did look a little dry, didn't look like it had been actually seasoned, and this is the funny part when it comes to, hey, blacks and whites, you had chicken bruh. Like we in the black community, that's the one thing that you don't have to worry about it at people's houses. It's chicken. We know how to fix chicken, and chicken isn't. Salt and pepper is not seasoning. And in those pictures looks like it was just salt and pepper on every dish. I mean, don't get me wrong, it, look like it, make a good diabetic menu. Didn't look like it had a lot of salt on it, but a lot of pepper. I had a lot of pepper on most of the the menus, but I didn't see any succulent juicy pieces of meat that it was coming out of there. And like I said, I'm a, I'm, I do my homework. So, he mentioned the fact that he got the best minority Award three years running. Now his restaurant is based in Elmore County, which is in Alabama. Now, to be fair in this assumption, Mr. D'Angelo. Your county only has 89,000 people. It's 657 square feet, the town. So I'm guessing there's not a whole lot of restaurants there probably to just choose from. And then it looks like it's a predominantly white area. So the things that you can pass for, with the. With blacks it might not be the same. Or with whites, you might not be able to pass that with black people. We just have a little higher standard when it comes to food. I know I'm from Chicago, so when it comes to food, I want, man, it's, it is not a lot of people that can top that. But when I go to the south, like I expect some good home cooked, southern food, I expect that to be like, like, Just like back at home, because in Chicago you can go to downtown Chicago, you can get anything that you can possibly think of, and just looking at those pictures, that's not some place that I would have stopped even if I was driving through, to get anything to eat. I have friends that are chefs, and every man, every meal that they prepare, it looks succulent, and again, I don't know. Maybe the food that's in the restaurant when you go there is better. But those pictures then justify it in my eye that, man, I just gotta try this place, but I'm not trying to bash the business. What I am concerned about is Mr. D'Angelo's. Way of dealing with the situation, we have to do better in the black community with dealing with business. That review that I read last came from it's just on Yelp Mr. Nicholas t Now, the thing that he said in the end of it was that he w it, it is sad that he had to have that experience Another. Another reason why, blacks don't support black businesses. And this is true, because when it comes to other cultures, other races, a black person will cater to those other races down to the T. But when it comes to other black people, we feel like we don't have to give them the same respect for that money. And why is that? The money is all the same. It's all green, is all on, debit card is all in, and paper cash. The fallback or the backlash in a lot of these instances are not really worth just clearing up the situation, especially in the case of this the groom Ernest, he said that they tried to reach out. And it seems like that they tried to reach out before they put it on social media. They have a, even have a copy of the invoice on the the page along with the pictures of the chicken. And I'm looking at this chicken right now as I'm doing this chicken does look like it's been cooked in some old grease. It is not, there's nothing golden about it. It definitely doesn't have any seasoning. And then the baked chicken look like it's just chicken that's not done, and I see a lot of pepper on this chicken, and I wish that I could put. That you could see these pictures because even the mac and cheese, the mac and cheese was definitely some craft mac and cheese out of a box. And so that's what I meant earlier when I said, come on you know the value, you know the type of time that you put into your work, and if you know that you didn't do it right, then man, make it right. Because now you got people like me. And, hey, I'm nobody, I'm a beginner creator, but you got people like me that are critiquing your business and maybe you really do have a good business out there in Alabama, and maybe you do have a customer base that really likes your food, but somebody didn't like it. And so, even from a business point, if I'd have made. A hundred thousand dollars in one year from a bunch of loyal customers that like doing business with me. And then there's one that I did business with that spent a thousand dollars with me. You don't think that I would take the$99,000 that I'd done made for the year, the a hundred thousand to subtract that 1000 to make it 99, just to keep stuff like this from happening. Now you, you got other people that are chiming in that also, because the other young man that that had the instance from last year, he didn't even post anything at the time until he seen this post and he said, oh yeah, I had the same experience. Maybe at the time he was thinking like, Hey, maybe this, maybe we just had a bad experience with this guy, but now that he's seen someone else with the same bad experience, he like, Hey, let me tell my story as well. That's just bad. And why would you Like we have had some unruly clients and customers and in this business that, my wife and I have, however, we have always gone. Over and above to make sure that those people, even if it evolved, giving them their entire, their, all of the money back, because at the end of the day, I would rather for you to say that, Hey, I didn't the experience wasn't the best to me, but, they did see that it, I expressed to them that it wasn't the best and they made it right. They didn't make me pay for the service. I would rather do that each and rather than to carry on how you carried on Mr. D'Angelo. Because again I'm here for both sides. I'm here when you from a one black man to another one. I'm here to give you accolades when you're doing good. And I'm here also to get on your top when you not doing good. This just happens to be one of the instances where you was not doing good. You can say there's a saying that has been around for ages. The customer is always right. There's no way. And again, maybe your restaurant food is good, but your catering seems like it's not up to par, because you've had two instances where people a year apart, where people have had the same complaints about, how you have handled business and. As a business owner for me to send someone else and not be the face of my own business. When there's a problem, then that's a problem because guess what? When it is time to receive the accolades when those three awards that you got for best minority business, I'm sure you didn't send the server to go get the award. You wanted everybody to see your face then so, Have the same energy when things are not going good. It's a coward move to hide behind someone else. If I was a server, I wouldn't I'd let you handle that. I'm not going out there to handle the dirty work. And it's just bad business. I hate that that this instance happened to those two individuals those two couples on their wedding day day. That's supposed to be all about the two of you. You want to share it with your family and friends, and you want, I don't know how many of you all that's listening have been married, but where does cost a lot of money? This invoice is for like 31, 30$200 for some craft, mac and cheese and some bogus ass chicken. Like, yeah, getting'em folks their money back, you got some bills due and you needed to use cheaper materials. That's not those people fault. You just can't be giving these people anything, and it's, it is just not right. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna stand for what's right and I'm gonna expose what's wrong every time. Again, I don't know these people personally, but to Mr. Ernest Jackson and your wife, man I'm just sorry that that you experienced that I wanted to do this segment, because we do. One when we start these businesses and these platforms, we want all of our friends and stuff to support us. We pass out our flyers, we, in some instances almost begged them to come out to support us. And then when you do support them then, and you have a problem, then that problem. And when that problem isn't properly handled. It make you not wanna mess with none of them. And unfortunately that's not, all of black businesses, but one bad experience sometimes ruin, ruins it for the bunch, and it makes people not want to support anyone, again, I have to be blunt to say, this happens more so in black communities, than in white communities. And, we just gotta do better, gotta do better. I don't have any, anything. Again, I don't know the couple that owns Wild Catering and I'm not saying anything bad about them in terms of them as individuals, but as far as you hand the way that you handled this business, that was foul, and to admit, I'm looking at the the post again right now, and you admit it. You said I could apologize for the chicken maybe being a little dry after four hours of sitting that. If you amend that the, that your service is bad, saying it is a, it is probably was gonna be a little dry. See, you are a chef, so, If I was getting food with you, I'm not really trying to hear that, that it's probably dry because it had been sitting, because see, you are a chef and you also know you should have the expertise that I don't have to know how to if this chicken was gonna sit for a few hours, how juicy you needed to make it in order so that it wouldn't be dry. You have the knowledge of putting an. For the chefs that might be listening to this, I don't, I don't cook, so y'all forgive me for the the misspoken lingo. I am not a chef. But I do know when my wife cooks and when I see women cooking and you have food even on the burners, man, them women to get. Get that little spoon and they'll, keep pouring the juices over the chicken. Keep pouring the, so that it don't get dry. And these are just regular people that's cooking. So you, a chef, you should know if you, if they don't have equipment for the food to stay warm. And while it marinates in the juices, I don't know. I can't tell you about no cooking. Products. But I do know that spoon and that juice in the spoon that's turning over on that chicken or that Turkey, I do know that worked, and I do know what homemade macaroni and cheese look like. And I do know what craft macaroni and cheese look like. And sir, that was craft macaroni and cheese, and that was some dry, fucked up chicken. It ain't no way, there ain't no other way to put that, but again, hey I hope that this gentleman for the two couples that experienced this, I hope that this gentleman makes it right with you all. I just wanted to do my part in using my platform to help you out with getting this experience out because sometimes if nothing is ever said, then nothing is ever done about it. So, I hope this reaches the couple to let you know that, hey, you wasn't by yourself. You got people I know people complain about social media all the time, but hey, social media sometimes can get people back in line, and to the gentleman that owns Wild Catering. Again, as I said earlier, I have nothing against you personally or your wife, sir, but the way that you handled this business, I did have a problem with And I would've felt the same way that these couples felt infuriated. So hopefully, you can get this squared away and make it right. So that'll be it for our discussion today. Hey, those of you have black black owned businesses. Let's try to do a little better job at tending to. Some of our own that are trying to support us, and let's just do better. Let's do better. Alright, I will talk to you all later. You have a good day. See you soon.