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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To not want to eat in Wetherspoons?

617 replies

giveitarestplease · 27/10/2021 23:13

Popped out with BIL and OH today, I absolutely despise Wetherspoons but they love a bargain and aren't too fussy.

I'm not a snob in anyway shape or form I just can't stand it. I eventually went with them and sat in there and waited until they finished.

I just hate the old dirty pubs and how fast the rancid food comes out 🤢 the alcoholics that have been sat there since the moment they opened the doors on the morning.

I'd much rather go to one of our local independent cafes and have a nice lunch and I know it's not coming out of the microwave. I know it's not the same price bracket but you know what I mean.

They always laugh and joke and call me a snob and say I think I'm better than everyone else. But I'm really not and I don't think that.

OP posts:
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19
Bun14 · 29/10/2021 09:39

@giveitarestplease

My parents wouldn't look down on me for eating there that's not what it is. They just see food like that (microwaved quick food)as rubbish kind of thing.

Didn't think I would ruffle so many feathers over me not wanting to eat in Wetherspoons! And also I didn't sit there staring at OH and BIL eating there food. I had DD with me and we both had hot drinks that we bought before we even went into there what we was drinking. I definitely don't sit there judging them for eating at Wetherspoons. If that's what they like I will go with them and wait for them to finish I still had a nice time chatting and catching up with them.

If you were hungry, couldn't you and DD just have lunch somewhere else and meet up with the others after?
CounsellorTroi · 29/10/2021 09:47

I once sat next to someone at a work night out, who sulked all the way through the meal because the restaurant was not of her choosing so she chose not to eat at all. It really spoiled the evening for everyone sat at our table.

Good god, how old was she, 9?

shakingmytambourineatyou · 29/10/2021 09:56

A point that is coming up over and over is people will not give their custom because they do not approve of the owner. I have never thought to research this before I went in a pub. Which other pubs do you
boycott because you do not approve of the owners of?

FluffyBooBoo · 29/10/2021 09:59

I once sat next to someone at a work night out, who sulked all the way through the meal because the restaurant was not of her choosing so she chose not to eat at all

Is there some major info missing (she's vegetarian and you went to a steakhouse, or ceoliac and you went to a pizza place [before they got good at catering for such things])?

If my colleagues were going to a place I really didn't want to go to then.. I just wouldn't go. How bizarre!

FluffyBooBoo · 29/10/2021 10:00

@shakingmytambourineatyou

A point that is coming up over and over is people will not give their custom because they do not approve of the owner. I have never thought to research this before I went in a pub. Which other pubs do you boycott because you do not approve of the owners of?
I used to boycott a local restaurant after the owner was done for child abuse. He no longer owns it.
IggleyP · 29/10/2021 10:00

I don’t eat in there either OP, or in premier inn type places. This is not because I am a snob; I happily eat in greasy spoon cafes if I want a cooked breakfast for example.

What I don’t want to do is pay around £10 for a ready meal to be microwaved and put in front of me. I don’t eat frozen cheap microwave meals at home, so why on earth would I pay 4 times the price to go out and have one?!

(Also, the one near me is always full of alcoholics who sit in the same chairs all day, and it smells bad in there, so the OP is probably quite correct in her description, they aren’t all lovely old buildings)

VapeVamp12 · 29/10/2021 10:02

We've got a newish Wetherspoons near us and its really nice! Total bargains.

Also, I know the owner is a bit of a prick but Wetherspoons paid more tax in the UK that Amazon UK last year.

FluffyBooBoo · 29/10/2021 10:03

they aren’t all lovely old buildings

Nobody has said that. However a few people have implied that they are all awful, which isn't the case either.

FluffyBooBoo · 29/10/2021 10:05

I have never thought to research this before I went in a pub

Oh, and no research needs to be done. All that needs to be done to know about Tim Martin's views on Brexit is to keep up with the news.

VapeVamp12 · 29/10/2021 10:06

Also, people saying how the owner treated his staff at the beginning of COVID, nearly every newspaper which reported the "get a job at tesco" stories have retracted and apologised because it was fake news. He actually said, if my staff need to go and work somewhere else during furlough / lockdown, they are welcome to.

Simonjt · 29/10/2021 10:42

[quote Pottedpalm]@Simonjt yes I do expect my ‘meat’ to be cooked to order! Unless it was a Sunday lunch carvery.[/quote]
Unless its a stake or bacon it isn’t cooked to order, it is reheated instead or has been kept in a heated area if its something slow cooked like lamb.

RampantIvy · 29/10/2021 12:28

Is there some major info missing (she's vegetarian and you went to a steakhouse, or ceoliac and you went to a pizza place [before they got good at catering for such things])?

Yes she is vegetarian. It was a work activity, and the management took us out for a paid for meal afterwards. The restaurant was an Indian restaurant (decided by the HOD), and I appreciate that not everyone likes Indian food.

However, there were plenty of non Indian vegetarian options available, but she said that she only wanted a pizza that night and wouldn't eat aything else. It resulted in her developing a banging migraine as well. I was sat next to her, and she spent all evening complaining abut not being able to have pizza.

I agree that choosing an Indian restaurant without consulting anyone was a bit of a risk, but everyone else was OK with it, and TBH the food wasn't that great anyway.

She is also a very picky eater. We once went to a rather downmarket pizza place in a shopping centre for our Christmas meal because it was the only place that did food that she would eat.

FluffyBooBoo · 29/10/2021 12:39

Yes she is vegetarian

Indian restaurants are generally great for vegetarians. If you'd gone to a steakhouse I would have a lot more sympathy for her.

Not everyone would want pizza, guaranteed. (I'm not the biggest fan. It's usually overpriced and fairly meh. But if I chose to go for one with work colleagues, I wouldn't sit and watch everyone else eat with a mardy face!)

Grapewrath · 29/10/2021 13:07

Who remembers 2 for a fiver? That was til isn’t and the caeser wrap and curly fries was the best.
Anyway it’s not somewhere I’d treat myself but a quick lunch in town would be fine. Yanbu dir
Yanbu for not wanting to eat there though, each their own

purplehair1 · 29/10/2021 15:17

Wetherspoons is a dive and I loath Tim whatsisface as he was so pro Brexit, then told all his staff to go get a job in Tesco’s rather than putting them on furlough. Vile chain vile food vile man. Would not even enter it.

sparepantsandtoothbrush · 29/10/2021 16:19

@purplehair1

Wetherspoons is a dive and I loath Tim whatsisface as he was so pro Brexit, then told all his staff to go get a job in Tesco’s rather than putting them on furlough. Vile chain vile food vile man. Would not even enter it.
Oh ffs there's another one! How many times do people need to be told that that's not what happened with the staff???
saraclara · 29/10/2021 16:27

@purplehair1

Wetherspoons is a dive and I loath Tim whatsisface as he was so pro Brexit, then told all his staff to go get a job in Tesco’s rather than putting them on furlough. Vile chain vile food vile man. Would not even enter it.
It's already been mentioned many times that that is entirely untrue. Read the thread. Someone's even put up a transcript of exactly what he said (which is checkable because it was also video'd)

His staff were put on furlough. He said that he would quite understand if they needed to work at somewhere like Tesco in the interim, and if they did, they would be prioritised for getting their jobs back at Wetherspoons when they re-opened.

I can't stand him for his Brexit views, but he treated his staff very well. Sadly the media retracted their lies in tiny hidden corners of their papers and websites.

Againstmachine · 29/10/2021 16:49

Love everyone saying wetherspoons are a dive, have hi been in all of them then?. And I bet there are plenty of other pub company's where they are also dives.

DrSK2 · 29/10/2021 17:22

What is wrong with being a snob?

Fluffmum · 29/10/2021 17:30

I don’t like the food there. Plus the carpets are really sticky

CMZ2018 · 29/10/2021 17:30

Please yourself, if you don’t like it eat elsewhere which it sounds like you did, or went without, don’t see the issue.

Crankley · 29/10/2021 17:31

I don't understand why you didn't go and do something different. I can't imagine sitting somewhere I hated waiting for someone to eat.

Pliudev · 29/10/2021 17:37

I wouldn't set foot in Weatherspoons because like others on here I wouldn't want the owner to make money from me. My DH thinks differently though. I cook every day and have been married to him for 31 years. OK don't be harsh, he's old now and not about to start cooking for me. I was however, peeved, when, in response to something I read, I asked what his favourite meal was. He immediately replied 'chicken curry' and I realised he meant the curry he has at Weatherspoons when he meets up with his mate.
31 years wasted in the kitchen.

NeedToKnowMoreThanThis · 29/10/2021 17:40

You are not being a snob at all. I would never eat (or drink) in a #neverspoons - this is mostly due to the politics of the owner (who I find to be a proper bellend), and partly because I care about what I put in my body. Well done for sticking to your principals - there are better things in life than saving a few quid.

Madamum18 · 29/10/2021 17:43

|I would have said "Fine you go to Wetherspoons. I am going to cafe. Meet me by at 2.00!!"