Perhaps you heard today about the mom in Washington state who was Facebook-shamed after being asked to leave a restaurant where her children, ages one and three, were being messy and loud. The restaurant owner, Lorraine MacDuff of Rainy Days Caffe, had pictures posted of the messy carpet on the restaurant's Facebook page, with a message: “Like to take a moment to thank our customers with small children whose kids don't make a mess. A couple of ladies came in today and this is the mess their children made.” In addition to the kids creating lots of scone crumbs on a freshly-cleaned carpet, by the restaurant owner's account, one of the kids “was screaming the whole time.”
After the mother of the children, Kellea Poore, went public with what happened, there were lots of people taking sides on the argument, vindicating either the mother or the store owner for what happened.
I support business owners running their shops the way they need to. Businesses are not required to provide service to any customer willing to pay. If some customers are costing them more business than they're bringing in, they should “fire” them or otherwise more carefully define how they will provide service to them in the future. (“All you can eat” isn't really all you can eat if you're consuming $40 worth of food for your $10 on a regular basis.) This is what Ms. MacDuff did: the ladies were welcome back, but without the kids.
Likewise, though, business owners should be able to experience any fall-out for their decisions, as this business owner did when her customer's story went viral. It needs to be this way in order for businesses to truly succeed: some have to be allowed to fail.
Which brings me to places where kids are allowed to be loud and/or messy:
- Chuck E. Cheese. There's a playground in the middle of the restaurant, for goodness' sake. Have at it; run around and have fun. There are good ways to save at Chuck E. Cheese so you can get even more fun for your money.
- Roadhouses. If you or your kids don't have peanut allergies, these places are great. Logan's Roadhouse, for example, all but expects you to throw peanut shells on the ground. We have one of these restaurants near me and it's a lot of fun to go there. I feel more than a bit of reckless abandon when I go there. There may be some deals to be had at a roadhouse near you if you go through Restaurant.com — and even more if you go through Mr. Rebates first on your way to Restaurant.com!
So, not all places may cater to parents with messy kids. And that's all right! But there are places that don't mind so much, so go there instead!
Fully agree with what has been said, although there is a line to be a drawn and I am not sure that all customers can be refused. Really depends on the nature of the business I would say, doesn’t it?