Dairy Queen owner, keep your emotions in check
Dairy Queen employees in St. John’s Newfoundland were caught with their pants down, no literally. A few employees found it amusing to shoot the breeze at work and drop their pants down while their derriere hung outside the drive-thru window.
Their antics did not stop there. Some employees engaged into snow ball fights behind the counter where food is prepared. Sounds like a ball of fun. Well not everyone is smiling. These shenanigans were filmed and posted onto Facebook for some quick jokes. But the video was removed quickly when the franchise owner found out about this buffoonery. The unfortunate incident about these capers was how franchise owner Albert Buott responded to the media inquiries. He used his emotions instead of relying on his key messages. He said, “Good God almighty. Where’s my managers? Who’s allowing this to happen?” There is a wrong and right way to respond to the media. Instead of Buott saying, how disgusted and disappointed he was by their actions, he should’ve responded by saying how he would’ve handled the situation. If he was unaware of how to act, he could’ve recovered by mentioning his key messages. Whatever the case may be, someone in the communications department dropped the ball. And they dropped the ball really hard. As a consequence, the owner’s remarks made headlines the very next day. Sadly, the focus was on, what Buott said rather than what the employees did. This is obviously the wrong message to convey in a crisis.
From a customer’s point of view, Buott’s reply is less than satisfactory. It implies something is terribly wrong with the way this Dairy Queen location conducts business. Not only are employees unruly but managers are virtually non-existent. This is not the image you’d want to convey especially in a small town where everybody knows your name.
FeelMyFire 
What a wonderful example of what not to say! And, as the manager of this location, how would it feel? The incident screams out to me: Dairy Queen hires idiot line staff, managers and executives.
You can’t always blame the communicator though. As a communicator, unless you put a lock on your client’s mouth and walk around with the only key in your back pocket, you can’t always control what they say. I’m sure DQ’s PR person got an instant headache when she headache when she heard what her client had said, but sometimes it’s hard to do your job when your client doesn’t understand the importance of what they say to the media. It would be interesting to see if there is any further response from DQ
Great post, you have pointed out some excellent points , I likewise conceive this s a very good website.