Chick-fil-A and Amazon
Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy was preaching to the choir.
On July 16 he gave an interview to K. Allan Blume, the “Biblical Recorder” who writes for the Baptist Press:News with a Christian Perspective wherein he covered a wide range of topics about his company which is managed, he says, on “biblical principles.”
This was my favorite line from the BPN article:
Based on Matthew 5:41, Cathy is on a mission to provide customers with “second-mile” service — exceeding even the highest expectations of a typical fast-food restaurant.
I liked that line because it rang true based upon my one experience at a Chick-fil-A restaurant. I was so impressed with the Cherry Hill area Chick-fil-A that when arrived home the evening after I had lunch there a couple of months ago that I told my wife about it as one of the highlights of my day. I never tell my wife about the fast food joint I eat at when I’m on the road.
I’d never heard of Chick-fil-A. I keep calling it Chickafil. My friend and I just happened upon the place during the lunch break of a meeting. “What is it, a Philadelphia area Boston Market?” I asked my friend who seemed familiar with the brand.
I was impressed with the place before my friend and I got in the door. There was a woman sweeping the parking lot that gave us a warm and friendly greeting while we were walking in. That struck me as an odd use of human resources during the lunch rush. And how does management get their employees to be so happy when they’re sweeping the parking lot? I had a vision of an employee of mine rolling her eyes when I asked her to do something she considered beneath her. This place must be up to something good I thought to myself. My only other memory of fast food employees outside of a restaurant was of those taking a smoking break.
Everybody in the place seemed happy. There were cartoons of cows celebrating decorating the place. No pictures of Jesus or the stations of the cross. The black woman who took our order (the woman cleaning the parking lot was white) was friendly and patient as we perused the menu for the type of chicken we were going to have for lunch. She didn’t look at me funny when I insisted on paying for my male friend’s lunch. She said thank you, not God bless you, when I paid and she apologised for the brief wait when delivering our sandwiches which she had offered to deliver to our table.
Half way through lunch, the parking lot lady showed up at our table offering free refills of our drinks. She would refill them for us.
I felt really welcomed and appreciated at that Chick-fil-A. Serving me and my friend seemed to be more important to the employees than completing the tasks of service. And it didn’t feel like a technique. It felt genuine. No one said, “Have a nice day.”
Based on Matthew 5:41, Cathy is on a mission to provide customers with “second-mile” service — exceeding even the highest expectations of a typical fast-food restaurant.
It worked for me that day in Cherry Hill.
But that is not why Chick-fil-A was in the news this week. Towards the end of his preaching to the choir interview with BPN Cathy said,
Some have opposed the company’s support of the traditional family. “Well, guilty as charged,” said Cathy when asked about the company’s position.
“We are very much supportive of the family — the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that.
“We operate as a family business … our restaurants are typically led by families; some are single. We want to do anything we possibly can to strengthen families. We are very much committed to that,” Cathy emphasized.
“We intend to stay the course,” he said. “We know that it might not be popular with everyone, but thank the Lord, we live in a country where we can share our values and operate on biblical principles.”
Cathy had no idea of the shit storm that was about to hit him and his company.
Jeremy Hooper at Good As You (G-A-Y) must have Cathy on google alert. The day after BPN posted the Cathy interview, Hooper posted another preaching to the choir moment, a clip from an interview that Cathy did a month eariler with evangelical radio host Ken Coleman. Cathy wasn’t talking about same sex marriage in the interview he gave Coleman on Fathers Day weekend. He was talking about the importance of strong fathers in the home. He was sharing the impact his father had on his life and how he raised his sons. That didn’t matter to Hooper, who took a clip out of context and posted it on G-A-Y with the headline: Chick-fil-A President and COO Dan Cathy says ‘arrogant’ same sex marriage = ‘shaking fist at God’ ‘invites God judgment’.
Cathy did not say that. He might believe it, but that’s not what he said. Same sex marriage wasn’t even the topic of the interview.
Same sex marriage was not specifically mentioned in the BPN interview either. Cathy is an advocate of traditional marriage. He is a witness to it. I’ve heard him talk about the damage to society caused by single parent households. The value to children, and to society, when a father and mother are present in the household. Opposition to same sex marriage is a fair extrapolation to take from his comments, but to characterise Cathy as anti-gay based on the BPN interview and the Coleman interview is disingenuous.
But that didn’t matter to HuffingtonPost’s GAY VOICES, who picked up the story from BPN and Hooper, including a reference to the Coleman interview as if it was about same sex marriage. Then the LA Times picked up the story. The mayors of Boston and Chicago then demagogued that Chick-fil-A was not welcome in their cities. The CEO of Amazon donated $2.5 million to help pass a gay marriage referendum in Washington state.
Should Governor Chris Christie now unravel the deal he made to bring Amazon to New Jersey? No.
Would Garden State Equality President Steve Goldstein have allowed New Jersey’s Democratic legislature take Christie up on his offer to put gay marriage on the ballot in New Jersey this fall if he knew that Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer were writing big checks to fund pro-gay marriage campaigns? Steve, if your reading, it’s not too late. The legislature is meeting on Monday to put another Constitutional Amendment on the ballot. Or, you could wait till next year and have the issue be at the forefront of the gubernatorial campaign.
Will social conservatives and traditional marriage advocates now stop buying books and toys from Amazon? Will conservative authors stop publishing their books on Amazon’s Kindle? Will they stop usings Microsoft products?
No. Nor should they.
There are not a lot of Chick-fil-A restaurants in New Jersey. Good thing for McDonalds and Burger King. Too bad for the rest of us. The only Chick-fil-A in Monmouth County is at the Monmouth Mall. I hate going to the mall, but I am going this week for lunch at Chick-fil-A. Not because I oppose same sex marriage. I’m going because I don’t like how same sex marriage advocates have treated Cathy and his company. I’m giving a Good For You (G-F-Y) to Good As You (G-A-Y). Meet me there Tuesday at 12:30 and avoid the August 1 Huckabee rush, if you like.
More from my site
Garden State Equality Launches Campaign To Convert Chick-fil-A Operators To Their Cause
Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day is an enormous success
O’Scanlon Reiterates His Support Of Gay Marriage
Is Mitt Romney “Evil?”
Is opposition to gay marriage biblically correct?
Why do you need a license to get married?
Democratic Leader Wants No Religious Exceptions For Gay Marriage
Ocean Grove Beachfront and Boardwalk May Not Get FEMA Funding To Rebuild
Gay married couple sues Catholic institution over medical benefits
Quinnipiac poll: New Jersey Supports Gay Marriage, Wants A Referendum
Christie’s deal with Amazon is a tax increase.
“Eat more beef”
Blogfinger of Ocean Grove barely prints both sides of this story. Oh, that’s right; Ocean Grove is the home of Ocean Grove United and the anti Kirk Cameron movement.
http://blogfinger.net/
They have censored a couple of polite comments on this issue. Thank God for Free Speech here, because, the left’s mantra and the media supporting that mantra; is do as I say; bow to our beliefs and your beliefs can go to hell.
http://blogfinger.net/2012/07/27/ocean-grove-united-holds-a-protest/
http://blogfinger.net/2012/07/25/og-tidbits-work-resumes-at-91-cookman-protest-planned-at-great-auditorium/
to scoop up a few EXTRA Chick-Fil-A sandwiches, (they are heavenly), and did the same when just on vaca in the south, as well.. here we go again, God forbid ANYone express their 1st amedment rights to free speech and opinion, when it ain’t the mainstream/ lib drivel of the day!.. ya don’t like what a company says/ stands for, go somewhere else!!.. that company, if you check it out, is an amazing American success story if you take the time to look.. they say who they are, what they expect from their employees, and, in return, will hire, train, and promote from within, and yeah, close on Sunday, ’cause they don’t mind losing revenue, on their Sabbath day.. ya don’t agree, fine, go chow down on burgers or other junk, elsewhere!!
best fast food restuarant I have ever been in.
YES!!! Eat Mor Chickin’
http://eatmorchikin.com/ 🙂
I visit the Monmouth Mall location often, after having becoming acquainted with the company in the South during college. Chick Fil A has sponsored a college bowl game for a bunch of years (and had telephone call in during it to get a stuffed cow for a number of years). Great company and the Monmouth location is very community oriented and has been VERY supportive of the Shore Regional football team. GO 1st amendment I will make special trip with husband and 3 kids on August 1st.
I will be eating at Chick Fil A every chance I get. The food is great, and the company is first rate. Most importantly, if they do well in the wake of the comments by those nitwit mayors in Chicago and Boston, it will be a huge setback to the politically correct, far left, hate America stormtroopers. My kids and their friends love the place, so this is one parent’s directive that they will be happy to carry out.
One of the great things about this country is that business owners (and anyone else) can express their political or religious beliefs to the public and potential customers can chose to patronize or not patronize those businesses.
As a pretty good rule of thumb, most large businesses and corporations try to avoid these types of controversies.
You say ” One of the great things about this country is that business owners (and anyone else) can express their political or religious beliefs to the public and potential customers can chose to patronize or not patronize those businesses.”
BUT THEN…
You allude to corporations avoiding such controversies.
THEY SHOULDN’T HAVE TO BOB…
It’s called Free Speech for a reason, it’s guaranteed by the Constitution. However, the specter and scourge of Political Corrections causes them to cringe.
Boycotts have been used throughout American history by various groups trying to force or prevent actions of one sort or another. So whether people like them or not, boycotts are here to stay. There have been pleanty of boycotts by conservative or religious groups also including the notible one calling for the boycott of Disney.
I think most people who are involved with sales at any level (including myself) would tell you that they avoid bringing up their political and religious beliefs with their customers. (If the customer raises the subject, that might be another story.)
The liberal owners of Ben & Jerry’s Inc. are extremely outspoken politically, yet calling for a ban of their business would be unthinkable to any conservative big-city mayor. Their company continues to thrive without government retribution, and THAT, Mr. English, is how it should be in a free society.
“If activists want to boycott Chick-fil-a, that’s their business. They are free to do so. The outrage is that public officials would now use the power of their office to suppress the livelihood of those who hold minority views. That’s indefensible.” DB
If we are now specifically talking about elected offcials, I believe that while they are always free to express their views, I would agree that political power normally should not be used to keep businesses from locating in an area because of the owners religious/political beliefs…and that includes all religious/political beliefs (within the law.)
Bob,
Under what circumstances would it be appropriate for political power to be used to keep a business from an area based on the owners’ religious/political beliefs? And what do you mean by (within the law)?
Art…I know that “within the law” opens doors to exceptions but I was thinking if there was a group or organization that was advocating something that was illegal and/or so heinous (which I realize is open to interprataion) under the cover of religious or political freedom, that business should not be forced on a community. Religious and political views would not fall under that umbrella since they are protected by the Constitution.
Not to stray from the original issue here which I think most agree on (business owners have the right to express their religious and political views and others have the right to boycott those businsesses plus elected pols should not use political power to keep businesses out of an area because of that business owners religious or political beliefs).
Towns/municipalites can also use zoning laws to regulate where undesireable business (adult products, etc) may locate. It would obviously be illegal for those laws to be used to ban or regulate a business based on the owners religious or politcal beliefs.
@”Boycotts have been used throughout American history by various groups trying to force or prevent actions of one sort or another. So whether people like them or not, boycotts are here to stay. ”
Boycotts are one thing. The jackboot of government stomping on the throat of law-abiding legitimate businesses is not. That was supposed to have been eradicated a little more thena 60 years ago.
Chickens and Sex, good grub and super service, strange brand name and freedom of speech.
This is why we all have such strong feelings about the right and wrong we perceive in our America. Not many places on earth, now or in the past, where chicken sandwiches and the folks who bring them to us would raise such far reaching thoughts and emotions.
It is nice, peaceful and unruffled to be able to sit back at a keyboard in the comfort of our homes and pronounce, speculate and ponder the yin and yang of individual beliefs and who or what decides the outcome, affects the conduct or pays the price for the privilege.
No gun shots announcing the sectarian differences or tanks gathering around the edges of the neighborhood threatening the young, the old or the just living.
It is important to remember these things when we participate in our self government.
We might think we are far along enough in our little experiment in democracy that strict and fundamental partisanship and the choice of the words and thoughts we use to categorize the “other” make us immune from the apparent folly of other political schemes in “other” cultures or political process’ but just as children are not born with prejudice and hate for one another we; are all one word spoken in haste, one difference in thought carried to its extreme, one political belief that becomes unmovable, one absolute that blocks considerate thought and a way to compromise; away from the club, the stone thrown through the glass house, the tank on the outskirts.
We have been given a vital and softly resonating gift. A gift that was bought with the blood, sweat and intelligence of millions. It is essential that those who are aware and care enough to invest in its health and future should be the most cautious and considerate of that gift, for everyone, whether we agree with their choices or not, has a place at the table whatever the entree.
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