Woman Who Lost Wedding Ring Handing Out Halloween Candy Could Use Your Help

(Eric Spiegel)

In what was definitely more of a sad, accidental trick than any sort of Halloween treat, an Arizona woman says she lost her wedding ring somewhere in the sea of candy she gave out Friday night to costumed kids. And though you might think it’s a long shot, she’s asking parents to check those trick-or-treat bags carefully.

If there’s one night where it’s acceptable for frenzied masses to crowd your doorstep clamoring for candy, it’s Halloween. And it was in that creepy chaos that the Mesa, AZ woman says lost her wedding ring.

She tells ABC 15 she’d put it for safekeeping in a candy jar while carving pumpkins with her daughters, and forgotten it was in there. During the craziness of handing out candy to trick-or-treaters, she accidentally dumped candy — and her ring — straight from the jar.

“When I first realized what had happened, I just lost my speech, I froze,” she said, adding that someone might not know they have the ring in their loot in the first place.

“I actually had plastic rings in there too, so it wouldn’t have felt much different,” she said.

It’s also not the financial loss she’s sad about — she and her husband couldn’t afford much when they got married when she was 20 — but the pricelessness of what it means after 10 years of marriage.

“If you were to try and pawn it or sell it you could probably get $50 for it. It’s not an expensive ring,” she said. “It’s my wedding ring, you know? I mean you could replace it but it’s not the same.”

Mesa candy lovers, start checking those loot bags.

Mesa woman loses wedding ring handing out candy [ABC 15]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Kmart Insists Customers Should Have No Layaway Problems At Closing Stores

Right now, there are two seemingly incompatible things going on in Kmart stores: the retailer is pushing layaway contracts for the holiday season, and also closing many stores. While the company insists that this should not lead to customer confusion, it took a while for some stores to get on-message.

This controversy started at the store in Springfield, Ohio, which is slated to close. Some customers complained to a local news station that they had been told that their layaway contracts needed to be paid off by November 1st, and couldn’t be transferred to Kmart.com or to another store that was remaining open.

A Sears spokeswoman told the WDTN that this wasn’t correct, but an undercover visit to the store showed that nobody had bothered to tell its employees that layaway contracts could be transferred. Two weeks later, Sears sent the station another statement to clear things up, but it would be interesting to hear what stores are actually telling people.

The retailer explained that it typically announces a store closing 11 weeks in advance, and the longest layaway contracts (a small minority of them) last for 12 weeks. This would mean that the customer who the station interviewed either misunderstood her layaway contract or misunderstood what store employees told her. Kmart explained:

In the case of a small handful of customers that do have a contract that goes past the store close date – it would only affect their contract by about one week. Meaning, they would potentially have to double up of one payment. The customer can choose which payment they want to double up on and they are alerted to this fact in advance.

When a store closes, customers are supposed to be able to pay off their layaway balance until the last day that the store is open. In theory. Keep that in mind if you’re using layaway in the coming months as Kmart closes a lot of stores.

Springfield K-Mart working with layaway customers [WDTN]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Red Lobster Changing Menu To Remind Everyone It’s Still A Seafood Restaurant

(Calgary Reviews)

Although it’s always fun to play the field, it seems that flirting with other kinds of cuisine isn’t working out so well for Red Lobster anymore. That’s why the restaurant chain with seafood in its name is returning to its roots with a newly revamped menu, ditching things like tortilla soup and pork chops in favor of more lobster.

It’s right there in the name, so why not play it up? The Associated Press reports that the made-over menu will push more fish and lobster dishes, upping the ocean quotient from 75% seafood on the menu to 85%, in an attempt to woo customers looking for a taste of the sea.

There will be more photos of the food, Red Lobster said, with four of the five new dishes on it involving lobster. The amount of shrimp in the “Ultimate Feast” platter will also bloom by 50% — which will come with an extra $1 added to the price of the dish.

The non-seafood items were a move made by Red Lobster’s previous owner, Darden Restaurants, in an effort to lure diners who won’t like seafood. Trying to get customers in the door that way didn’t work out so well, as sales slumped.

“At the end of the day, we believe that seafood is really why people come to Red Lobster,” Salli Setta, Red Lobster’s president told the AP.

This return to the sea comes after Darden spun off Red Lobster last summer, selling it to Golden Gate Capital, a move which saw the chain attempting tactics like changing the way food is piled on the plate to make dishes appear more visually appetizing, as well as ditching low-price food specials to appear more classy.

Red Lobster changes menu to re-emphasize seafood [Associated Press]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Nearly 100 People Attended A Wedding They Weren’t Invited To On A Southwest Airlines Flight

A Louisville couple got hitched on a Southwest Airlines flight over the weekend.

If you’ve ever watched a wedding-themed reality television show, then you probably know there is no shortage of unique and somewhat strange places for couples to get married. After this weekend we can add another to the list: a non-stop Southwest Airlines flight from Nashville to Dallas.

USA Today reports that a couple took their love to the sky, tying the knot on a 737 jet in front of family, friends and complete strangers.

The couple, Dottie and Keith, travel frequently for work and though that saying “I do” in the air would be a memorable event.

“We were literally sitting at a gate in Baltimore, waiting for a flight and just thinking what should we do? And we thought, ‘What about getting married on a plane?,'” Dottie says.

And so, Keith contacted Southwest asking if they would host the event.

Ana Schwager, Southwest’s community affairs and grassroots manager, said the airline loved the idea and thought it would be the perfect complement to its newest non-stop flight from Nashville to Dallas Love Field.

Because the couple frequently travels for work with Southwest, they were able to use their nearly one million Rapid Rewards points to purchase tickets for 30 family members and friends to witness the nuptials.

The blessed event kicked off shortly after the flight reached a cruising altitude over Arkansas, Schwager tells USA Today.

The flower girl passed out peanuts, and then the bride walked down the aisle.

“We are gathered here today – whether you intended to or not – to celebrate the wedding of Dottie and Keith,” the officiant said to the 141 passengers on board.

Although it was a tight squeeze at the front of the aircraft, the wedding went off without a hitch – no one pushed the call button to indicate the couple shouldn’t be lawfully joined together.

In addition to hosting the couple’s wedding, Southwest agreed to send the couple on a honeymoon to one of their newer tropical destinations: Puerto Rico.

Wedding at 32,000 feet is a first for Southwest Airlines [USA Today]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist

McDonald’s Trademarks Slogans That Are Even Worse Than “Lovin’ Beats Hatin'”

“Lovin’ > Hatin'” beats “Lovin’ Beats Hatin'” in a showdown of the awful, awful slogan ideas that McDonald’s is kicking around.

Late last week it was reported that McDonald’s would launch a marketing campaign in January with the phrase “Lovin’ Beats Hatin'” at its center, but the reality of what the burger behemoth actually trademarked makes those three words sound almost authentic by comparison.

Following the immediate blowback to last week’s slogan leak, a McDonald’s rep told Yahoo that Lovin’ Beats Hatin’ is “incorrect and not a new slogan,” but maybe that’s because, as BurgerBusiness.com points out, there are two much worse variations of this viral catchphrase that McDonald’s trademarked last week.

First up is “Lovin’ Is Greater Than Hatin’,” which is like saying that lovin’ beats hatin’, but in a more awkward, wordier way.

And because shortenin’ is greater than writin’ out the whole slogan, McDonald’s has also trademarked “Lovin’ > Hatin'” and is really, really hoping that everyone remembers their greater-than/less-than symbols from elementary school.

We wouldn’t be shocked if the lovin’/hatin’ campaign has been scrapped and never sees the light of day, which makes us wish it had never been leaked; it would have made for some delightfully awful ads.

But the trademarks do at least show that McDonald’s is indeed seriously thinking about going the love/hate route.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

Chef Who Threatened Yelper Over Negative Review Issues Public Apology

One of the messages sent via Facebook from the chef to a customer who left a one-star review on Yelp. That review has since been deleted by Yelp, even though the chef stated that he no longer had a problem with it.

We recently brought you the story of a restaurant customer in Cleveland whose one-star Yelp review of a new eatery led to the chef/owner sending the customer angry, threatening messages via Facebook. The Yelper subsequently told us that he’d received a private apology from the chef, but that the restaurant continued to mock him through its social media outlets. After weeks of not directly addressing this story in a public forum, the chef posted an apology late last week.

“The fact is, I said some really stupid things,” admits the chef in a lengthy note posted on the restaurant’s site. “I’m genuinely sorry for saying those things. I wish I could take them back, but I can’t. However, I’m here to apologize, and to try to make it right and learn from it.”

He admits that he did “act crazy, irrational, and said some horrible things,” in response to the negative review, but takes issue with those who labeled him a racist for comments in the initial messages to the customer like how he was dining with an “ugly Indian bitch behind your ugly Asian bitch’s back.”

“I am not a racist,” writes the chef. “I work with and employ people from all different ethnic backgrounds… I thank everyone who has reached out to me regarding the issue of me being racist, as people who know me personally know that this is not the case.”

On Friday evening, the Facebook page for the group boycotting the restaurant posted its response to the apology.

“We accept your response and we will no longer ask people to join, share, or continue the boycott,” begins the note, which then goes on to point out that there are still some concerns about the chef’s statement.

For example, in his apology, the chef mentioned that one of his business partners — who has released a statement of her own — is Indian-American, but the boycott group says that just because one may not be considered a racist by those that know him doesn’t change the fact that he made racially and sexually charged comments that crossed the line.

The things written by the chef in those first messages “will never change and always be offensive,” says the group. “Reference to a woman of South Asian descent as ‘Punjabi puss’ is a racist and sexist comment. Reference to a woman as a ‘bitch,’ ‘an ugly piece of shit,’ or an ‘ugly Asian bitch’ is sexist.”

Also on Friday, the boycott group says that both the original 1-star Yelp review and the update posted a few days later have been removed by Yelp and that the customer is currently no longer allowed to post anything to the restaurant’s Yelp page.

We could see why Yelp might remove the update — as it didn’t involve the actual experience of eating at the restaurant — but even the chef acknowledged in his later messages to the customer that he no longer had any issues with the original review. We’re reaching out to Yelp to see if it can provide any more information, and will update if we hear anything back.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

John Oliver: Lowe’s Robot Won’t Keep Couples From Killing Each Other At Hardware Store

Last week, Lowe’s unveiled the test of a customer service robot at one of its Orchard Supply stores and we pointed out that it’s really just doing the job Lowe’s should be asking of its employees. What we were remiss in mentioning is the other important aspect of home-improvement store customer service — preventing married couples from murdering each other while shopping.

Thankfully, there’s Last Night with John Oliver, which noted that Lowe’s OshBot might not be able to sense those moments when a couple’s discussion of something as innocuous as paint color can unearth years of resentment and tension.

“If you really want to test your marriage, go buy home supplies together,” explains Oliver in the above clip. “Because Lowe’s is like a swinger’s party or a couple’s brunch — no one is leaving on speaking terms.”

So Oliver and his crew, with the help of the Director of the Pawnee City Dept. of Parks and Recreation, created a spec commercial for Lowe’s main competition, Home Depot, to highlight the all-important marriage- and life-saving skills of the customer service expert.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist