Zack Randolph, an 18-year-old employee at Great American Cookies decided to something for a police officer who came by to pick up some dessert.
The teen told the officer that he wants to pay for his treat as it was a sweet gesture by him to thank the officer for what he does. Zack took out his wallet and paid the $2.75.
“He’s just a really nice guy and on top of that he has a badge,” he said. “That’s enough for me to buy him something. That’s the least I can do.”
Days after this Zack’s act of kindness, the company managers called the teen and “wanted him fired.”
His mother Tami Randolph wrote in a Facebook post on July 5, 2017, and claimed a family in the store verbally attacked him after the kind act and said, “Are you going to buy mine too?”
According to her, the man told her son, “You know you’re probably going to get fired.”
“He put his daughter down and came around to the side and was about to come back and come at me and thankfully my assistant manager and my co-worker stopped him,” said Randolph.
“Thankfully his manager refused and said you are an excellent worker and everyone agreed that you did nothing wrong,” the mother wrote in the post.
“Since when does buying a police officer a cookie give anyone else a reason to attack someone. And when did a Corporation want to FIRE someone for being KIND, taking what a customer said or did, regardless of how hateful they are,” she added.
Later, Great American Cookies Company issued a lengthy statement apologizing to Zack Randolph and wrote, ”First, we want to issue a public apology to Zack and we hope to connect with him soon. We regret how this was handled. On behalf of Great American Cookies, we are sorry. This type of situation is not indicative of our Brand.
Great American Cookies is a brand that has proudly supported veterans, military, police officers, firefighters, nurses, and other community servants regardless of whether they wear a uniform for the last 40 years. As a franchiser, our units are independently owned and operated.
When a situation occurs at a local store level, we immediately contact the franchisee and work with them to investigate the situation. Our understanding is the issue at Katy Mills store and the subsequent suspension of an employee was due to a misunderstanding regarding an altercation with a customer.
It had absolutely nothing to do with him buying a brownie for a police officer, which is a practice that is strongly commended.”
First, we want to issue a public apology to Zack and we hope to connect with him soon. We regret how this was handled….
ADVERTISEMENT Posted by Great American Cookies on Monday, July 10, 2017
”Given all that is involved in this situation, it needed to be clearly understood from a Franchiser perspective and enforced within the confines of the Franchise Agreements.”
”Both Franchiser and Franchisee want a measured, strong response to this situation, which includes:
(1) Continued emphasis that the incident was investigated and the suspension reversed.
(2) The employee will receive pay on his upcoming pay check for the entire period of his suspension.
(3) The Director of Operations for the Franchisee who oversaw this store and situation has been relieved of all duties and responsibilities related to the Katy Mills store as a result of this incident.
(4) The franchisee has committed to additional management training at all levels to ensure that situations like this are investigated, documented and handled better in the future.”
A Texas police department honored the teen and Katy Police Department posted a photo on Facebook of Zachary Randolph, with three officers, praising the teen for his “selfless deed.”
“It was our pleasure to finally meet the young man from Great American Cookies, who did a selfless deed despite what others may have thought,” the Facebook caption said.
“Sergeant McClure and the rest of the Katy Police Department would like to say thank you for supporting law enforcement and going the extra step to show your appreciation.”
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