“It got overwhelming,” said Brandon Ching, who was working the counter at Greenberg’s Bagels, a popular sandwich spot in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. “We were short-staffed today so it really added extra stress to my day.”
And customers were frustrated at the delays. Ebenezer Ackon told BuzzFeed News he was in 3,630th place in line to talk to GrubHub’s customer service when he gave up, after waiting more than an hour for food, and went to get something from across the street from his apartment.
Blake, who didn’t want to use his last name, said the small Brooklyn cafe he ordered from received 200 orders in five minutes as soon as the promo began, so they reluctantly had to cancel orders — including his.
“It’s been a complete disaster,” Nathaniel, a Manhattan resident who asked that his last name not be used, told BuzzFeed News. He’d been thrilled that his order from a highly-rated sushi restaurant went through but after an hour of waiting, no response from the restaurant and nothing from GrubHub, he cancelled the order.
“I hope they get blasted for this extremely poorly thought out promo,” he said.
One of BuzzFeed News’ own called Blue Ribbon Fried Chicken in Manhattan to check on her order after it was marked “closed” on the app, and an employee said they had done so to handle the 47 filled orders that hadn’t been picked up.
Of course, plenty of customers were thrilled with their “free lunch” — remember that giving a company your email address and phone number, both required to make an order, is a valuable thing for a company to have! — filling up previously empty Manhattan salad spots to pick up now much cheaper overpriced salad.
Source: https://www.buzzfeed.com/kelseyweekman/grubhub-free-lunch-nyc-promo-chaos