Tiff at Tim Hortons

by julianw | May 23, 2008 at 04:14 pm
1727 views | 22 Recommendations | 6 comments

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Tim Hortons, Canada’s biggest (and American-owned) donut chain, made headlines earlier this month for firing an employee after she gave a free Timbit to a baby. On Wednesday, the company kept the terrible public relations train rolling with an outrageous incident at a Toronto store.

A brouhaha over breakfast for a homeless woman has put Tim Hortons on the defensive again, the latest in a series of public-relations black eyes for the Canadian coffee giant.

A woman in Toronto ran afoul of a downtown Tim Hortons outlet Wednesday morning after buying breakfast for a homeless woman. An employee was reportedly unhappy the homeless woman stayed in the coffee shop to eat, telling the Good Samaritan - investment manager Teresa Lee - that homeless people "make a mess."

Tim Hortons spokeswoman Rachel Douglas said in an e-mail Friday that the homeless woman had previously been disruptive in the store.

"Anyone who poses a risk to a safe customer environment is not welcome in the stores, especially if they have a history of making threatening disturbances," Douglas wrote.

"Staff was reacting to that history; of course the customer could not have known that."

Tim Hortons later apologized Lee.

"We strive for 100 per cent customer satisfaction but we appreciate the need to do even better," Douglas wrote.

recommend This comment thread is now closed
Amy Judd
Amy Judd
flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 16:19 on May 23rd, 2008

julianw, I like this story. It's good stuff. Tim Hortons is not really living up to its 'Canadian image' at the moment is it?

rpshen
rpshen
flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 16:37 on May 23rd, 2008

julianw, I like this story. It's good stuff. Very interesting story. Good job for keeping an update on Tim Horton`s rather poor public relations behaviour recently.

0
julianw

Not at all! According to this article, which features criticism of Tim's from Canadian radio icon Stuart McLean, even the famous "roll up the rim to win" contest was controversial this year.

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Diana Nevermind

I LOVE Timmies.....Yes l'm addicted to mocha's and have ALWAYS had A-1 service. :)

Diana Nevermind has contributed a photo to this story.

azzayindia
azzayindia
flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 05:20 on May 24th, 2008

julianw, I like this story. It's good stuff.

0
lannon787

lannon787 has contributed a photo to this story.

This story was created over 3 months ago, the comment thread is now closed.

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Amy Judd
First Flagged at 4:19 PM, May 23, 2008 by Amy Judd
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