A bizarre story about America’s most popular coffee chain has hit the news and it’s not for the squeamish. During Halloween, Starbucks got into the holiday spirit by selling a drippy red Zombie Frappuccino that looked like blood. Doing such a thing is a common advertising method that many companies practice to provide customers with a nice change of pace.
Adding coloring to a drink seems harmless enough, but for one family, they claim the Halloween frappucino they received was a nightmare.
As reported at the New York Post, while the promotion was all in good fun, one family is suing the coffee-maker claiming that they were served real blood in their beverage.
Amanda and Luis Vice say they had no idea there were any problems with the drinks, which they purchased at a San Bernardino Starbucks in February 2016. They didn’t notice until they brought them home to a 2-year-old girl and began drinking them.
“Once we drank it, then we could see on the inside of the rim that there was blood,” Amanda Vice told KTLA. “She was licking the whipped cream where it had been sitting on top.”
Two of the cups had a visible red stain, and one emitted a “strong metallic smell,” KTLA reported, citing the family’s lawsuit.
“My wife and my baby just drank someone’s blood,” Louis Vice said, describing the panicked aftermath of the incident. “It was bad.”
The lawsuit the family filed claims that the company knew that an employee had been bleeding, but did not adequately keep the worker away from customers’ drinks.
Starbucks is apparently preparing to defend against the strange accusation: “We are aware of this claim, that allegedly took place in 2016, and are prepared to present our case in court.” a spokesperson said in a statement.
The family immediately got blood tests after the incident and all tests indicate that no diseases were transmitted, assuming their story is even true. Tests on the cups themselves have yet to be conducted, as the final analysis will occur in several months.
When the family initially went public with their claims, Starbucks offered each family member $1000 and free drinks for a week, which is a pretty amusing gesture and was obviously going to backfire.
Now the company is facing a litany of lawsuits, including negligence, fraud, intentional infliction of emotional distress, battery, and assault.
“We felt sick to our stomachs, we shouldn’t have to worry about going to get something to drink and there being blood in our drink where we could get sick,” Vice told KTLA. “It’s very stressful.”
The only thing left to do is wait. Until the cups themselves are tested, there’s really nothing that can be said. But no matter what happens, this whole ordeal is quite peculiar, and should the family’s story turn out true, Starbucks is in for a world of hurt and bad PR.
Source: New York Post