Convenience store chain 7-Eleven is investigating an incident that occurred at an Alexandria, Va. location involving three clerks who allegedly did not sell chips to a black man and his son until a white woman stepped in. A spokesperson for the chain said the video does not show the whole story.
The video, posted to Facebook and reported on by The Root, begins with the man with the child insisting a female clerk sell him the chips.
“I don’t care what you say, ma’am. I’m not leaving the store,” the man says.
An older white woman approaches the counter and asks to buy the chips. “You are acting like crazy people,” she tells the clerks. “You’re in the customer service business. Ring this up right now!”
Another female clerk relents, while the woman points at the clerks and threatens to report them to the franchise owner.
Angry customers have posted the video of 7-Eleven’s Facebook page, where a representative responded, “Thank you for taking the time to make sure that this was brought to our attention. We were made aware of this video and incident on Monday afternoon and our team has since launched an investigation into this.”
“Unfortunately, this video neglects to tell the whole story and is clearly meant to create unrest and misdirect anger,” a spokesperson for 7-Eleven said in an email today. “We have video that has been turned over to local law enforcement of the individual who was not served and who was stealing from the store several times, causing disruption in the store and intimidating other customers. Neither race or racism was a factor in what happened in that video. The franchisee for this store, herself, is Black/African-American, and during the incident on tape another African-American customer was served. We explained this to the Caucasian lady who purchased the chips. She was sorry that she was outspoken against the employees and was sympathetic to their predicament.”
The video contains NSFW language.