Minneapolis Cafe Calls Out Teens Who Didn’t Pay On Facebook And They Paid
After two teenage boys left The Lowry Café in north Minneapolis without paying for their meals, the café owner decided to reach out to the local community to track them down. After the post was made on Facebook, the shamed boys came in and paid their bill.
Taya Kaufenberg, the owner of The Lowry Café, wanted the two boys to do the right thing, so she put up a post on the restaurant’s Facebook page, asking if any of their 2,250 followers knew who the two teenagers were so she could ask them to come in and pay for their stolen meal.
She posted two images of the boys on the Facebook post, saying one of them was a middle schooler and initially received criticism for exposing the teenagers in this way.
Minneapolis cafe encourages teen thieves to come forward – KMSP-TV https://t.co/P6tJI5qlhs
— lollobrulli (@lollobrulli) April 5, 2016
After she made the Facebook post, Kaufenberg was accused of racism and criticized for the public shaming of children, who widely use social media. However, Kaufenberg reckoned it was better to teach them a harsh lesson about stealing via the social media than for them both to get a criminal record by involving the police in the matter.
While she was criticized for her actions, the plan did work.
She made the post on Facebook on Monday, and two days later, the older of the two boys came into the restaurant and paid for the entrée they had stolen from the restaurant’s takeout counter.
As reported by the Star Tribune, Kaufenberg said, “I knew if I posted, someone would know them.”
Speaking of the criticism of her actions for posting their images on Facebook, as well as the accusations that what she did was racist, she explained that some people offered to pay for the food, but she said she preferred to teach the two boys a lesson.
“People offered to pay for the food, but for me it wasn’t about the money so much as it was about the lesson and the community coming together.”
Boys steal meal at Lowry Cafe, pay later after shaming on cafe’s Facebook page. https://t.co/8NqW6wgmjO
— Star Tribune (@StarTribune) April 7, 2016
Following the success of the Facebook community call-out, Kaufenberg says she hopes to reach out more to the community and to start discussions on how to solve the larger problems, including hunger, which she feels may have led to the boys’ theft in the first place.
Kaufenberg went on to say that she has deleted the post from the restaurant’s Facebook page, as it has now served its purpose in reaching out to the two teenagers. She did say that if something similar occurs again with kids stealing food from the restaurant, she might choose to avoid using a photo of them, but she confirms that she is happy with the results of the post.
Kaufenberg said that while she doesn’t really like to use the expression, “it takes a village to raise our children.”
According to Fox 9, which published the photos of the two boys, a similar theft happened on Tuesday, but this time, it wasn’t the same suspects, Facebook wasn’t used, and the situation was totally different.
Reportedly, The Lowry Café often has a problem with people calling the restaurant up and ordering takeout but never turning up to collect and pay for their food, meaning the food is wasted.
According to Kaufenberg, they need to organize a better system with their takeout orders, adding that “it’s sad that a few bad apples have to ruin our trust for everyone.”
What do you think, readers? Do you think Kaufenberg was right to publish the photos of the two boys on Facebook?
[Photo via Flickr by Christopher, cropped and resized/CC BY-SA 2.0]
