This month, Consumer Reports magazine rates fast food restaurants, and in the hamburger category, the California-based chain In-N-Out Burger sits at the top. Though I've lived in Los Angeles since graduate school, I've never been in one.
Nor do I intend to.
Therein lies the tale.
But let's go back a bit first.
Ever since my school days, I've had plenty of friends urging me to join them on an In-N-Out run. Who knows why I never did initially? Maybe I didn't like the design, the name, the unfamiliarity, the jingle, I have no idea. There was nothing compelling keeping me away.
Then, I discovered something about the company that did make me hesitant. The company was putting Bible verses at the bottom of soft drink cups and inside burger wrappers. (Not the verse itself, but a pointer to them. For example, Matthew 21:7). I wasn't offended -- hey, it's their store -- just that hiding messages seemed sort of creepy to me. And they themselves clearly recognized that many customers wouldn't like it, otherwise they'd have been upfront, rather than trying to sneak "code" into some crevice underneath the French fries.
But that's not the reason I won't go.
We have to step back again.
I don't celebrate Christmas. It's not my personal faith. But I love the season. Good cheer, fellowship, bright lights. And especially the music.
I've always loved Christmas carols -- not just the secular holiday songs, but even the sacred music. Time was when radio stations played Christmas songs all December to set up the season. Over the past decade or so, however, programming began to change, and although Christmas shopping ads started earlier, Christmas carols were starting later, rarely played regularly until the week before December the 25th.
That wasn't enough Christmas music for my taste, and so for the past 10 years I've been putting together a big collection of Christmas songs. Searching out used record stores, buying CDs, taping off the radio, making MP3 files. And at this point, I've got almost 100 recordings. All so that starting on December 1st, I can start playing Christmas music everywhere. Fa la la! It's wonderful. And by the time Christmas comes, even though it's not something I celebrate, I'm all the more full of the spirit of the season.
And on Christmas Eve, I always seek out one of those radio stations that plays Christmas music for 24 hours "with limited commercial interruption." I let the music play throughout my home (and every year listen to the brilliant BBC recording of "A Christmas Carol" with Sir Ralph Richardson and Paul Scofield -- the best adaptation of the story I know of) and then waft off to sleep with my clock radio on all through the night. No, it's not my personal faith, so it doesn't have that particular meaning for me, but it's lovely music and a joyful lifelong tradition.
Which brings us to The Reason.
I'm guessing you can sense where this is going. But trust me, it's worse.
One Christmas Eve, perhaps 15 years ago, I found one of those All Christmas Music stations. And that particular year, those limited commercials were sponsored by In-N-Out Burgers.
Once an hour, a special holiday commercial would come on. "In-N-Out, In-N-Out, seasons greetings from In-N-Out," followed by a warm greeting by the spokesman, spinning a gentle word of holiday kindness to all. I listened for hours and eventually drifted off the sleep.
In the middle-of-the-night, about 3 AM, I drifted back half-awake, and the radio was of course still playing.
What I also heard was a new In-N-Out Burger ad. And I was soon staring bleary-eyed at the radio. I can only paraphrase from the distance of 15 years, but what I heard was --
"In-N-Out, In-N-Out, seasons greetings from In-N-Out."
"This holiday season, give the greatest gift a person can give. Give the gift of Jesus. Put Jesus in your heart and pass the joy of Jesus Christ to others. Believe in Jesus and bring Him into your life. Merry Christmas from In-N-Out."
"In-N-Out, In-N-Out, seasons greetings from In-N-Out."
And I was now wide awake.
I want to be clear: I think that In-N-Out Burgers has every right to make ads like this. It's their company, it's their belief. They can spread the gospel all they want, and I completely understand.
I just think it's a terrible way to sell hamburgers.
The next day, to make absolutely sure I'd heard the ad correctly, I wrote the radio station. Remarkably, I received a phone call from the station manager, who confirmed it and was mortified, apologizing that the station had only listened to a couple ads, yet approved them all. "We never would have put that ad on had we heard it first," he said.
I also mentioned the ad to a very conservative friend who is a devote Roman Catholic, to get his reaction. And he was extremely upset by it. "This is not how you should sell burgers," he stated. "And this is not how you should promote the Church."
Anyone can feel differently. But this transcends religious belief.
I just personally think it's a terrible way to sell hamburgers.
I don't care how "good" anyone's food is. When I'm eating my burger and fries, I don't want that to come with a side of preaching. I don't want to be sermonized to in a restaurant. That's why God created churches and temples.
Personal belief is one thing, even for a corporation. But honestly, if someone is asking you to patronize their store, asking you to spend your money on their products, then telling these very same potential customers that their personal faith is actually wrong and that they will never be truly happy or ever fulfilled or saved by God Almighty is just, to me, a terrible way to sell hamburgers.
I simply prefer to give my money to businesses that aren't suggesting that I'm probably going to Hell.
By the way, despite the fact that I'm a (nonreligious) Jew, I, too, like Christmas music, although in more limited doses. A couple of suggestions:
On the pop side: The Roches "We Three Kings".
Classical/traditional: The Choir of King's College, "O Come All Ye Faithful"
It's subversive and to some would be insulting.
If they want to use their product to proselytize, then why not just call them Jesus Saves Burgers?
Could it be that that would alienate some people?
If they can't take the heat and marketing fallout from being open and honest, then maybe they should decide what they really want to do; either sell burgers or do missionary work. Don't mix the two.
Again I say it his choice in a free society to spend his money as he wants. It's just that a company that openly advertises that they are preaching the message of Jesus and that others should do so on Christmas Day shows that they at least openly saying they are a Christian company by choice. I wish other companies would do the same instead of hiding behind the "Happy Holidays" sentiment. Then we could all decide if these companies should receive our money too. I will keep giving money to In-N-Out because they have a great product. I don't care about what message they are trying to send and that is my choice in this still free nation.
That being said... this is a really dumb reason to boycott a great restaurant, or even a mediocre one. Allowing one incident at 3am from FIFTEEN YEARS ago to color your perceptions of something to the degree that you won't even try the product is the kind of deep seated single mindedness more commonly found in the religious right.
On the other hand, I feel comfortable backing up everything I wrote.
First, this isn't a "boycott," in its commonly-used action. I'm not calling for others to stay away, just expressing my reasons why I personally don't want to patronize a restaurant. People stop going to businesses for all manner of reasons. Suggesting to customers they will likely go to Hell seems as good a reason to choose a competing restaurant as most.
Second, as I clearly noted in the piece, I hadn't been into the restaurant chain even before this, so it isn't what kept me out. It's merely what has continued to keep me out.
Third, what is clear is that this is corporate policy. The point isn't that it's "one incident: -- it's that this is part of a policy that is core to the corporation. The advertisement is merely a public manifestation of that policy. They knew what they were doing and saying when they made the ad.
Fourth, just because something happened at 3 AM is moot. Sneaking in your policy when people are sleeping doesn't make bad policy okay. And just because something happened 15 years ago is moot, as well. Absent any indication over the intervening years that the company has changed its policy and also is apologetic at proselytizing its customer base, it remains intact.