When You’ve Been Ground Down Too Much

This woman, who used to come into the coffee shop I managed, was the real-world equivalent of Dolores Umbridge. She was smug, obnoxious, and delighted in being a giant pain in the a**. She came in daily and had a ridiculously complicated drink order that she was unnecessarily nitpicky about. 

She came in one day when our grinder was having issues, which I warned her about. I happened to be on register and not on bar, so my employee (who was my best employee at the time) made the drink. She took it and left.

The next day, she came in, and before she even hit the register, she announced very rudely in my general direction:

Customer: “You’re making my drink, right?”

I switched places with the person on bar in order to make it. As her drink was so wildly complicated, it took several minutes to make. Throughout that time, she told me how terrible her drink had been the day before, how it had ruined her day, how she’d lost faith in the company, etc.

I apologized profusely and offered to comp her drink.

That was not good enough.

Customer: “I want the person who made my drink yesterday fired.”

I lost my temper.

Me: “I’m sorry your drink wasn’t up to par yesterday, but I already apologized, offered you a free beverage, and warned you that we were having equipment issues. That’s the likely culprit, not my employee.”

She sneered at me.

Customer: “You must have woken up on the wrong side of the bed.”

Me: “No. You are a giant pain in the a**. Your order is obnoxious, and we bend over backwards to accommodate you daily.”

She had a whole list of demands beyond the drink; a specific number of napkins, the sleeve facing a certain way, and more.

Me: “If that’s how you feel, please take your business elsewhere.”

Coffee Umbridge tut-tutted her way out of my shop in a huff.

I didn’t even care if I got in trouble for telling her off. (I didn’t.)