Bar-B-Screw-U : The Story of the Resto That Tried to Go Cheap-O

Wazzup Pilipinas!

Never in my life have I encountered such a restaurant where the management was a strange group of weird and struggling entrepreneurs.

I received an invitation on Facebook by this lady to visit a new restaurant in Timog Avenue corner Tomas Morato to try out their food. Below was her message:

"Hi there, a good friend of mine just opened a resto at Timog Ave in QC and I'm doing a bit of social media stuff for him. This is the first of its kind restaurant in the Philippines so I thought you might want to be one of the first bloggers to review it? Here is the facebook page of the resto with some pictures and videos.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Bar-B-Screw-U/ If you want to come experience this new concept and do a review, let me know and I'll arrange a visit for you and a friend. Or if you prefer, just visit the resto in your own time. We are happy to provide a giveaway to your readers too, maybe we can discuss ideas about how we can work together? Look forward to hearing from you."

I blog about food and new restos so I accepted the invitation:

Me: "Sure. We would love to visit the resto. Just send us the dates/time when we could visit, or maybe we'll just drop by when we are near the area. The giveaways to our readers will be great! Let us know what exactly will be the items and how many. Thanks!"

Bar-B-Screw-U: "Wow, great ! So Any kind of giveaways sir?"

Me: "For the giveaways, that will be up to your group what kind.... but of course, it should be a minimum of 1K or more in value to make it attractive to those who will join our contest, raffle, etc. If you want to promote your resto further, then perhaps GCs at your resto will be the most ideal,.... or anything useful."

Bar-B-Screw-U: "Ok sure, no worries with that sir, ill message you tom. for the sched, im really hoping that you could visit us. "

After a couple of days:

Bar-B-Screw-U: "hi sir im from bar-b-skew, are you available this weekend?"

Me: "Let me know the exact date and time please"

Bar-B-Screw-U: "Are you free on sunday? 7pm."

Me: "We prefer lunch time please."

Bar-B-Screw-U: "ok sir, whos with you po ba? Is it free for you guys?"

Me: "? I don't understand your question?"

Bar-B-Screw-U: "babayaran po ba nmn kau? ask ko lng po"

Me: "Aaahhh... Usually we don't call it payment when an organizer invites us to their events. They just call it tokens or complimentary gifts."

Bar-B-Screw-U: "ok sir got it, so free kau bukas?"

Me: "I also need to know how many can I invite to join me tomorrow.

or do I just bring along one of my friends?"

Me: "Hello_______ , just text me at ___________ if its all set for tomorrow at lunch time.. We will proceed to your resto after going to church. Thanks. I need to log off na for the night... thanks"

Bar-B-Screw-U: "ok will text you"

  

My wife and I attended the invitation after going to church and we tried their Southeast Asian inspired street food done indoors. The only thing nice is that you get to cook your food in a no-pollution environment at the convenience of a clean restaurant though the food serving was too small as compared to the bigger chunks or bits available from your favorite "Manong" or "Manang" street food vendors.

What makes it different from the street food outside or on the streets?

Pros: 
1. You are safe from street pollution going to your food.
2. You are comfortable sitting in the comfy chairs.
3. You are sure that your food are cleaner.
4. There is an option of dining on other dishes aside from the barbecues.

Cons:
1. The servings of skewers are too small.
2. The street foods are admittedly tastier. 
3. It is more expensive compared to the street food.
4. The acting PR is a backstabbing bitch.
 
Why is she a bitch?

After lunch, we discussed on the idea of a bloggers event when they told us another blogger was inviting fellow bloggers for a bloggers event at their resto scheduled on the 30th of October.

They agreed I organize a second batch.We left and went home afterwards. A few days later thru text messages, they asked for ideas on what to give the bloggers as tokens. They asked me if resto vouchers will suffice. I told them the minimum amount of GCs that we usually get at events as a suggestion....and they said it was something they can arrange.

I wasn't able to join the scheduled food review because of a conflicting schedule so I just monitored the event by asking my fellow bloggers some info thru text message inquiries. 

Later, I was shocked when bloggers told me there was no tokens given. I was even more surprised when the people from Bar-B-Screw-U sent me this text message:

"Ross you promised "big name food bloggers" when you first brought up the idea of organising the event. I don't think you had complied to our promise either? Having said that, we will be sending out GCs but the value will reflect the worth of their blogs. Mind you we had another group of 15 more prominent bloggers in last week and even they were happy with a lesser valued token."

Here's the cheap-O resto's letter to the bloggers after the event....and after sending me a text message that they will provide food vouchers or GCs to the bloggers but the value will reflect based on their perceived worth of their blogs.

Hello Bloggers,

First of all we would like to our express our sincere gratitude for your visit tonight, we hope you enjoyed your dinner and experience.

I understand that _____ has posted some nasty words about us and we would like to take this opportunity to provide our side of the story.

Last week we invited ________ and his partner to visit our resto in good faith, he enjoyed his meal and during our discussion he made the suggestion of organising a bloggers meet up with some big name food bloggers and started naming some celebrity bloggers to entice us. He also suggested that we provide a token. We have never dealt with celebrities before so we asked him what would be a reasonable token and he suggested "at least 1k".

So he had set the expectation in our minds that a celebrity blogger is happy to accept a 1k token, and hence a non-celebrity would be happy to accept a lesser valued token. It's like someone putting the idea into your head that a big house is valued at 1 million, therefore in your mind you would think that a smaller house is valued at less than 1 million. It is simply a matter of perceived value, a value that was set by Ross,not by us.

We are not undermining you or your blog's value, the fact is we really do not understand what your blog is worth. To add to our confusion, we had many bloggers visit us and reviewed last week who did not ask for anything at all. So in our mind, such a review is worth somewhere between 0 and 1000, what exact figure we are not entirely sure.

It was never meant to be a demeaning comment on our part, we appreciate each and everyone of you which is why we were super happy that all of you visited tonight. We had also told everyone to leave their emails so that we can email you your tokens after.

Bar-B-Skew is just a start up business and like all start ups, it is a struggle just to survive the first year, let alone the first month. So it is not by choice that we are being careful with our expenses, it is a matter of survival. We hope you understand.

Having said all this, we will honor _______' promise of 1k GC for each and everyone of you who attended. We will send out a digital copy of GC later tonight.

We are sorry if there has been any misunderstanding about all this. And we sincerely apologise if you had felt insulted in any way, it was not our intention.

Kind Regards,

Bar-B-Screw-U

PS. Please forward this to anyone who attended tonight we have missed out due to misspelling of their email.

Here is their email that was sent individually to the bloggers. Take special note of the part of the message which I highlighted in red.

Hi ________,

Again we would like to extend a big thank you for taking time out to visit Bar-B-Skew tonight. All we intended was to provide a venue for bloggers to meet one another and try out a new restaurant at the same time. We just wanted everyone to have a good time.

Please understand that the event tonight was not a small investment on our part, and we do not expect much in return, all we ask is that if you enjoyed your time tonight, please help spread the word however you can. Like us on facebook, do a foursquare review, post on instagram, tweet about us, etc. Every little bit helps.

If you are kind enough to take time out to write a review on your blog, there will be a further token of appreciation for you. Attached are 2 Gift Vouchers for you to do as you choose, you can use it for yourself, give to your friends, or use as giveaways on your blogs. Your vouchers will be activated once you send us a link to the review. A link to our website (www.bar-b-skew.ph) and/or facebook page (www.facebook.com/BBSkew) would be appreciated.

Getting people through the door is not an easy task for a new business, especially one that has only been open less than a month. We understand that bloggers have the power to make or break us, so please be kind if ever you decide to post a review. A bad review could potentially destroy the business and the staff's livelihood and I hope we haven't done anything to deserve that.

Kind Regards,

W____
Bar-B-Screw-U

Here is my side of the story:

Don't believe their excuse guys. I have all the email and text messages intact so I have proof that there was no mention of inviting celebrity bloggers...

If they will put me in a bad light I will dedicate several articles for them to expose how cheap they really are and how demeaning they looked at you guys.

Its up to you if you will write about them. Just wanted to let you all know that I was just looking after the honor of the blogging community.

I was outraged when they said you were not big name bloggers and will decrease the amount of your GCs based on what you are worth.

It is crazy that they would assume that a celebrity blogger will be happy with a 1k GC token, and that a less popular blogger will settle for less.

I am not after the token or the amount. I am after their word of honor...and the insult they made me feel declaring the bloggers I invited were not big enough for them.

When I tried their place upon their invitation, I did not receive any token, and I never expected any.

But they were the ones who asked me to form a bloggers event, and they asked me what they can give in return...so I told them what I usually get as a minimum after attending most events. They were the ones who offered a token...I gave them a suggestion and they agreed to it.

That's it. Nothing more...

I was only angry when they told that me they will decrease the GCs amount because they felt that the bloggers who came were not big name bloggers or as they call it on the email..." celebrity" bloggers...

How would you feel if somebody calls your friends the "lesser" class?

I am not going against you if you're going to blog about them. It's up to you. But I will never deal again with liars and cheapskates who try to deceive just to get reviews for less your true worth.

Admittedly, the bloggers I invited may not have reached the status of "big name bloggers" yet. But the resto owners could have just stayed away from saying that frankly and just requested to lower their promised tokens.

My wife was there when we were discussing these with the owners...and she was even shocked on how the owners were trying to turn this around against me....and trying to make me look bad.

I emphasize...I did not negotiate for a value for the bloggers' tokens. I just gave the Bar-B-Screw-U owners the minimum amount of token that I normally get after attending events because they asked for it....and never made it look like bloggers always require a payment or ex-deal.

I have been organizing events and I have never requested for a specific amount or token. I will always tell the sponsors that its up to them and that it is not compulsory.

I posted this article because of the Facebook status message above. I know this was meant for me because FYI , I am still her Facebook friend and she knows I will be able to read it in my timeline...Unless I am wrong and she is also against a different person of similar circumstances.

So to the owners of the Bar-B-Screw-U restaurant, I pity all of you! But instead of cursing you and wishing for your downfall. I hope this blog post attracts many people to visit your resto. I would prefer that many customers go to your resto to try what you have to offer so you'll realize that we "not so prominent" and "not big name" bloggers can also influence people. Just don't allow this person to be the one serving the customers because she's a real "bitchy brat".

Praying for the owners to wake up and become more sensitive to the feelings of people.....and if in case I was so insensitive as well, the hatred was just too deep back then. Let us also hope time will erase their hatred so everyone can finally move on.

Update: Apparently, this blog article is working. It has also attracted the attention of a group of bloggers who has been throwing insults against Wazzup Pilipinas. I know the real reason why they are doing this.

I've posted the above screenshot a few weeks ago at my group and they all interpret the sarcastic "Bwhahahaha "reply negatively.

It says a lot about these group of bloggers.

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