Food 'Influencers'

I got a kick out of this piece I found on line:

Our small restaurant was featured on a social media influencer’s blog. She has almost a million followers, and she gave us a good review. She never mentioned anything about being an influencer when she was here, she paid in full, and (if I recall correctly) she left a generous tip. Her review was also positive, with some valid observations and criticisms. (We were very busy that day, so she had to wait a while, but she was also understanding.)

All things considered, she behaved the way influencers should do. Sadly, her post seemed to get us inundated with a lot more “influencers” who thought they could get a free meal for exposure, or who acted so entitled because they had around ten-thousand followers.

It became such an issue that my manager came up with a system.

A customer has just been seated, and I can tell from all the equipment on the table (smartphone on a stand, directional microphone, separate light source) that this is going to be interesting.

Customer: “Yeah, hi, so I heard that your place is popular with influencers.”

Me: “We’ve had a few.”

Customer: “Yeah, so, what do we get?”

Me: “Get?”

Customer: “I’m an influencer, so what can you do for me?”

I immediately point to a sign our manager put up on our largest open wall.

Sign #1: “If you have to say you’re an influencer, you’re not an influencer.”

Customer: “You think you’re being cute, right? I have almost twenty-thousand followers!”

I point to yet another sign on the same wall.

Sign #2: “An influencer has over 1,000,000 followers.”

Customer: *Flustered* “Yeah… well… my followers are all organic! I didn’t buy them like some posers!”

Me: “You’ll be paying for your meal, ma’am, regardless of what influence you have on social media.”

Customer: “This isn’t going to go well for you when I upload this.”

Once again, I point to another sign

Sign #3: “Threats of negative reviews before you’ve tried the food will result in a ban.”

Me: “It was a pleasure serving you today. Please use the nearest exit to your left.”

Customer: “Wait, what?! You can’t just kick us out! Where’s your manager?”

Me: “She’s the one who put up all the signs. Have a nice day!”

And with that, I went to serve my other tables. The “influencer” and her friend sat there having a flustered conversation for a minute before sheepishly standing up and leaving. That was the only time I got to use three of the signs in one go! (There are a total of six on the wall, by the way.)

[Jenise]

Jeez.

Speaking of this kind of thing, I had a situation a few weeks ago. I live in a tiny little county. There is still a newspaper here but it's a POS, and has very few subscribers. In fact, a recent civic problem in which the county's intent to do something in my area was published in that paper resulted in all of us (including City Hall) learning that the public had not been suitably notified since the Herald only has 83 subscribers in the affected area at this end of the county. So by comparison, the fact that I have over 1200 local followers of my little foodie Facebook page is more meaningful than you might otherwise think. My opinion does fill seats, so you might call me an influencer.

I dine anonymously in the restaurants I go to. My motive isn't free food, it's to help the industry around here thrive a little more than it would otherwise. My page fills a void. How else do people find out about great local food without someone like me?

I have a good friend with a wine blog. She's not a critic per se and doesn't try to be one. She is a bona fide journalist turned PR specialist, however, and she takes a rah-rah approach to posting about the wineries who supply the wines. In many cases it's the same wineries over and over, relationships she cultivated years ago, and she's hooked up with several distributors or people who work for distributors to put people like her in touch with wineries looking for free advertising which she earns with her wine reviews. (She has like 11,000 followers on her Twitter feed.) And she goes on paid junkets which includes meals and accomodations.

So two weeks ago my brother, his partner, Bob and I went out to lunch at a local bistro. I know the chef there and asked if he was in. He wasn't. We placed our orders, and I playfully texted Wolf to say, "I'm here, where are you?" I just wanted him to know that I'd been in. Well out came the chef on duty to let us know that our entire meal was on the house. After lunch they sent out a bunch of desserts, though we'd ordered none. I posted a great review, as deserved, paid for the wine we ordered from the list and left a whopper of a tip for our most excellent waitress.

So a few days later I was on the phone with the wine blogger. She asked about this lunch and I mentioned that Wolf had comped it, which wasn't about me but about what a great guy Wolf is. She bristled that I had not revealed in my review that the meal had been comped because in her line of work it was essential. Well, exCUUUUSE me! I had to tell her: this was not a junket. I was not invited to the restaurant, I walked in there as a customer freely choosing where to dine and intending to pay for our meal like everybody else. We did not order everything on the menu nor did we add to our order once we learned it would be comped. It was comped because the chef is a friend (who I knew from another restaurant in another town before he got this gig) and my previous reviews have already proven good for his business. That was him saying thank you. The meal being free did not change the praise given one iota.

Anyway, her criticism really irked me as you can tell. I do not do what I do for personal gain. I don't want free anything. How she could confuse my facts with hers, I don't know.

At the risk... I'm kinda with her. Whatever you intended, the tl;dr is that the resto gave you food because they hoped you'd write them up nicely. That is the definition of a junket, even if you went along naively or unwillingly.

On the topic of pushy influencers, have I posted here a whole long technical explanation I found about how one such an person wrote a bunch of automated processes that, essentially, churn out free meals for him without his having to do anything more?

[Jenise]

At the risk... I'm kinda with her. Whatever you intended, the tl;dr is that the resto gave you food because they hoped you'd write them up nicely. That is the definition of a junket, even if you went along naively or unwillingly.

But this is like the fourth time I've eaten there and written about it. Never got 'free' before--and didn't expect it now. My BIL is a southern boy and I wanted to show him that there was some good southern food in town. And I don't agree about the definition of junket--that would be an organized freebie, whether for one or 100, that one knew was going to be hosted in its entirety when you left home which is why you left home. Not the case here.

We were just regular diners, and the chef is a friend. That, I believe, changes everything. I would also be concerned if I mentioned it and it made people question my motives for doing the page at all. It really is for the betterment of my community, nothing more.

I wonder what signs #4, #5, and #6 say?

-Paul W.