oh cracker on a cracker half restaurant and half gift shop part Southern Charm
and part controversy here are 10 Secrets Cracker Barrel doesn't want you to know
The Razor's Edge 2.3 thick inches baby chef wax every ever heard the spooky Halloween story of
the unfortunate trick-or-treaters who found a razor blade stuck in their candied apple but
in the case of Cracker Barrel it turns out truth was Stranger Than Fiction in Myrtle
Beach South Carolina regular customers Irene Gran and her husband dropped into their local Cracker
Barrel for their usual lunch but on this fateful afternoon their lunch was anything but ordinary
halfway through her hamburger 56 year old Irene was rushed to the hospital after discovering she
was mysteriously bleeding from the mouth shocked by the event the restaurant manager dug through
her leftovers and discovered a chunk of razor blade buried in the middle of her hamburger patty
the incident sparked immediate action from Cracker Barrel as the chain recalled paddies from over 300
of their restaurants both police investigations and internal investigations were launched into
The Meat Packing plant itself as well as the 18 other Cracker Barrel locations in South Carolina
but to this day it has never been established exactly how the mystery metal wound up in the poor
ladies burger while in the end Irene Gran didn't require stitches she had people in stitches of
laughter by shockingly declaring her intentions to go back to the same Cracker Barrel for lunch
when she'd healed up it sounds like old habits are hard to break that's not ketchup ketchup
just like my mom puts on a spaghetti baby in 2011 a Cracker Barrel restaurant in Kingwood
Texas served up a stomach turning Special Sauce to one unsuspecting customer Susan Mosher stopped
at the location for lunch with her husband and it didn't take long before she thought something
didn't taste right the side of fries that came with her classic BLT sandwich had a familiar
looking red topping but it sure didn't taste familiar Susan noted in an interview that some
of her fries and the plate they were sitting on were covered in red fingerprints unmistakably red
that is with human blood naturally she panicked a quick line of questioning discovered that one of
the line Cooks had cut himself while preparing the order which led to the gruesome incident to make
matters worse Susan was a cancer survivor and was understandably concerned she might contract
a blood-borne illness from the exposure while the restaurant manager tried to smooth things
over by offering to cover the cost of the meal it wasn't enough to soothe the obvious health
concerns Susan made the reasonable request to have the line cook take a blood test to check
for communicable diseases company representatives for the restaurant swiftly denied the request and
released a statement to the press that suggested she quote needs to work with her doctor for
medical Guidance the best they could apparently do was issue an apology letter to Susan included with
two fifty dollar gift cards so that she might enjoy her next visit to the chain unacceptable
seriously the old saying goes that you can't put a price on your health but it looks like
Cracker Barrel begs to differ must be something in the water water sucks Gatorade is better it
was May of 2014 when Cracker Barrel customer William Cronin became another victim of a lunch
surprise but his was of the liquid variety after wolfing down his dinner at a Tennessee Cracker
Barrel location William asked his waitress to bring him a refill to one wash it all down with
but instead of another cool ice water he got a cup full of chemical catastrophe you folks have
a water problem after a few swallows he felt a painful burning sensation running down his
mouth and esophagus causing him to have intense coughing fits and shortness of breath it turns
out that instead of water the glass had somehow been filled with a chemical kitchen cleaner and
poor William had just chugged it the concoction in question was known as ecosan which is a
chlorine-based specially formulated surface sanitizer commonly used in the food service
industry and is certainly not safe for human consumption the incident caused him severe and
permanent injuries including reflux pain bloating regular cramping and regular diarrhea the symptoms
were so consistent and severe that they cost Mr Cronin his job as a factory worker as he could
no longer report to work after pursuing legal action against Cracker Barrel will eventually
settled a lawsuit with the restaurant chain the case against the franchise was so overwhelming it
took a jury only 30 minutes to decide in Williams favor ordering the restaurant to compensate him to
the tune of five million dollars not part of a complete breakfast where's my soft boiled egg I
scramble it while nobody likes to find eggshells in their breakfast they might seem edible next
to this accidental ingredient in May of 2021 a Cracker Barrel customer had an egg emergency when
they discovered a metal Staple in their scrambled eggs and to make matters worse for Cracker Barrel
that customer just happened to be famous rapper Kodak Black who has over 1 million followers on
Instagram with whom he shared his horror oops not far behind was kodak's lawyer Bradford Cohen who
also posted the photo of the scrambled egg staple to his IG account suggesting the restaurant reach
out to him for comment Dangerously messing up someone's food is definitely bad publicity but
it might be even worse when it involves famous folks and their lawyers show your support by
hitting that like button we do appreciate it now let's keep going The Show Goes On steamed
shareholders no it seems all these famously questionable incidents at the customer level
start with how the whole operation is being run at the corporate level in June of 2020 one of Cracker
Barrel's largest and longest running ownership groups issued an open letter to management
regarding some questionable business practices that group is the big Lowry Capital Corporation
headed by Mr Sardar big lorry and they represent almost nine percent of the restaurant's ownership
by holding over 2 million shares in the company and Mr biglari is raising a big fuss it seems
Cracker Barrel's stock just doesn't measure up plummeting in comparison to its direct competitors
like Denny's and the Cheesecake Factory and losing shareholders upwards of 36 of their
investment value Cracker Barrel has been measuring earnings and losses separately for the restaurant
side of the business and the gift store side but reporting them under one big happy Cracker Barrel
umbrella of all the recipes in the cookbook this one might be a recipe for disaster hiring policies
if anyone comes to see you I'll scare them away You're hired it turns out that Cracker Barrel's
Down Home Country image has been a front to hide all kinds of misconduct over the years and it
extends beyond the customer and corporate level to even the hard-working employees themselves in
fact in 1991 the chain amended its official hiring policies to specifically Institute discrimination
with a bit of sneaky wording they authorized restaurants to fire anyone they considered not
to have quote traditional American values and they weren't talking about apple pie and the
4th of July the policy was specifically designed to fire anyone who wasn't heterosexual and crazy
as that sounds today they largely got away with it at the time only Massachusetts and Wisconsin
had laws against discriminating on the grounds of sexual identity so there wasn't much legal
pushback to be had against the policy only nine people were brave enough to come forward and claim
they were dismissed on the grounds of this policy and even though there was no retribution through
legal courts there was through the court of public opinion there was a large public backlash to the
practice and someone even leaked a copy of the policy to the Los Angeles Times to have
it ridiculed in a broader scale busted Cracker Barrel quickly backtracked on the whole policy
but that wasn't the end of their discrimination disasters tone deaf I'm very disappointed in you
in 2018 Cracker Barrel was sued by the EEOC equal employment opportunity commission EEOC
is a federal government agency designed to enforce civil rights laws against workplace discrimination
and the restaurant franchise face discrimination accusations yet again again and again and again
the charge was that a location in Maryland refused to hire an applicant for a dishwasher position
because they were deaf when the applicant showed up for the job interview the store manager was
noted to be visibly uncomfortable interacting with a disabled person and pretending not to actually
be the manager repeatedly mousing she's not here to the applicant until they left the location went
on to hire three other dishwashers all of whom were not deaf the whole thing was charged as a
violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act with the eeoc's regional attorney noting that it
was not only illegal but downright cruel parking lot problems are you uncomfortable around people
with disabilities that's okay lots of people are surprise surprise Cracker Barrel has had more than
one run-in with the Americans with Disabilities Act the chain had spent several years in the
mid-2010s dodging complaints of sales counters bathroom stalls paper towel dispensers parking
spaces and parking signage that all failed to be handicap accessible finally their day to deal with
it in court came when they faced a class action lawsuit in 2014. American paralympic athlete
Sarah heinzel was the lead plaintiff in the high profile case alleging that the handicap parking
spaces and ramps at several restaurant locations she frequented were too steep Sarah testified
she always needed to bring her mom along just to help her get inside the restaurant whenever they
went an investigation shortly uncovered that a staggering total of 107 Cracker Barrel locations
across seven different states had handicap ramps and parking spaces that did not meet the federal
regulations for use the lawsuit was eventually settled in 2017 ordering those 107 stores to
be brought up to code and full inspections to be done on no less than 536 of its other restaurant
locations ah very nice the chain paid out 7 500 to Sarah heinzel for her troubles and at
last she could go to lunch without bugging her mom for a little help repeated racism
oh the other N word no no this list is not stuck on a loop Cracker Barrel has even more history of
discrimination in 2004 21 people filed a class action lawsuit against the chain accusing them
of widespread racist actions the case cited specific incidents of racism occurring in
Cracker Barrel locations across 175 cities largely brought to the Forefront by Black
customers the group accused the chain of poor treatment toward African Americans including
seeding them in separate sections from White customers or refusing to serve them in the
restaurant at all while they would move to serve white customers instead that lawsuit
cost the company nearly 9 million dollars and you'd assume Cracker Barrel learned its
lesson well it didn't because the whole thing happened again two years later this time it was
their own employees suing Cracker Barrel for racial discrimination they also cited
the usage of racially charged slurs and sexual harassment targeting employees of color enough
the payout for that one cost the company another two million dollars and considering Cracker Barrel
are clearly a repeat offender it might just be a matter of time before they have to do it all over
again let's hope not sneaky employee tactics 100 minus 43 take the one from the zero wait the 2006
lawsuit was not the final time this controversial Chain's employees got fed up with things yet
another class action loss it was filed in May of 2021 by Cracker Barrel employees this time
accusing the company of undercutting their pay 26 pages of evidence have been brought forward in the
case showing that the restaurant has repeatedly violated the fair labor standards act lawyers note
that there has been a quote intensified scheme to Rob workers of their tip money intentionally
getting them to do work that doesn't require tips and sneakily depriving their payouts to pay them
less than minimum wage the tactic was to have workers spend most of their time on menial tasks
that technically didn't earn the workers any tips like stocking supplies fridge cleaning or table
setting why would you do that unless you're trying to trick me somehow but Food Service workers
require tips to complete their hourly wage and the whole thing has ended up costing them 20 of their
earnings it's a good thing Cracker Barrel is well liked for their food because their treatment of
shareholders customers and employees would leave a bad taste in anyone's mouth at least there's that