Five Guys’ chief executive officer, Jerry Murrell, said he gave a $1.5m bonus to employees of his US-based burger restaurant chain because “I didn’t want anybody shooting me” after the company recently “screwed … up” a buy-one-get-one-free promotion.
Murrell did not elaborate on the comment, which he gave to Fortune in an interview published on Wednesday – but it came a little more than a year after the UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot dead on a midtown Manhattan street in what was widely considered a murderous rebuke of the US health insurance industry’s profit-driven practices.
Fortune’s conversation with Murrell revisited a two-for-one promotion that Five Guys organized in February to celebrate its 40th anniversary that proved to be much more popular than the chain expected. Five Guys’ app crashed as customers sought to take advantage of the promotion, and many overwhelmed chain locations discontinued the offer early, inviting backlash on social media.
Luigi has done more for US workers than any number of politicians.
Or unions.
I wish more people would shoot ceos.
Be the change you want to see in the world… because I’m certainly not going to do it
I wish there was more like pragmatic political action taking than just violence mongering on lemmy, but thats just me
Ideally but when change doesn’t come because the system suppresses it, extreme acts result.
Jeez what a privileged jackass. “My wife still looks at me like I’m stupid”.
This is totally not because he thought they deserved it, just fear.
If murdering billionaires in the street scares them into … improving the material conditions of their workers…
The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.
There really aren’t that many of them.
I think it’s ineffective with the psychology of most people of this type. Their fear isn’t death. It’s losing what they have.
They have made the amazing of material worth and power their primary goal In their life. They’ve probably had to screw over friends. They’ve probably had to ignore family. In a lot of ways they’ve sacrificed their “life” or their humanity to do this. They know they are are mortal, but if they go out with more than other people they’ve “won”.
To die with nothing… To have lost it all despite all the sacrifice. To end the game having “lost”. That’s what they fear, and it’s why so many of them cannot do what this guy did and share with employees. Even $1.2m is a really small amount. Five guys has 30,000 employees globally but is probably ⅔ US (20k). It’s no more that $100 each.
So I say, don’t kill them. Take their money and make them live like the rest of us.
You just keep killing enough people down the chain of inheritance of the money.
They use mob tactics, we use mob tactics.
How, how exactly are you going to ‘take their money’?
With a … law? A wealth tax?
They control the system that would implement such things.
Social power structures and incentive systems have always operated through more than just the plainly stated, officially emphasized mechanisms.
I would argue that actually the reason why more common people don’t act more ‘forcefully’ is the reasons you outline as applying to the billionaires.
Set it up as a modified game theoretic prisoners dilemma.
The average person, despite standing to lose absolutely much less, is much more afraid of losing what they have, because they determine that they much more likely to be caught and punished.
So, every common person thus ‘defects’ against every other common person, despite them all standing to gain massively if even a minute percentage of them learn to become Great Value Brand Agent 47.
Of course, there are a number of multi millionaires and even billionaires that already recognize that when enough common people do not fear death, we will just kill them.
Thats why a good deal of them are building bunker complexes… but also another subset of them choose the strategy of basically begging to be taxed.
Morality totally aside, trying to determine actual true beliefs vs outward actions aside … it would make strategic sense to reward those begging to be taxed for at least outwardly displaying more humane behavior, by not going after those ones.
This is what I keep saying but everyone gets pissed at me for not being diplomatic.
Yeah, because your average billionaire or even high-end millionaire gives two shits about diplomacy.
I am actually surprised, normally when I say something like this, a whole bunch of people pop in to call me an insane hypocrite coward terrorist.
But uh yeah.
The whole point is to dispense with the formalities.
Because the formalities… are the system.
The system that is run by… apparently, largely a lot of literal child fucking murderers, who just also happen to have a lot of money, from fucking people over in slightly less literal ways, as a lifestyle.
Another example of the real Free Market at work. He was worried about backlash from both employees and customers, and came up with the only solution a Sociopath Oligarch can - throw money at it. But the point remains, he was responding to threats from the marketplace.
Luigi is another great example. That CEO’s policies hurt enough people that it eventually spawned a customer angry enough to take action. In the wake of that action, his company, and OTHER health insurance companies loosened up their denials, and a lot of people got health care that had previously been denied.
THAT’S a perfect example of the Free Market working the way it’s supposed to. MAGA should be thrilled, right? Nah, the LAST thing they want is a Free Market. They want a market that they can easily manipulate for their own profit gains.
Wikipedia says 5000 employees. $300 each. On $2.2b sales in 2024.
What’s his personal incentive?
That’s sales not profit. 5 guys is very successful but not to profitable. They use high quality ingredients, prine locations so rent is very high. Their bread is only made ina. Few locations and goes bad in less than a week. It’s a tight ship they run. I was a GM there for a while. Seen the PNL every month for my bonus. Labor cost and food cost was about the only thing I really could control, everything else was through the roof.
And yet, I can still get a better burger for cheaper from half a dozen mom and pop shops in my town that all pay their people more than minimum wage.
Seriously, 5 Guys is high on my list of most disappointing burgers.
Indeed. I tried it once and it was a clammy mess that really needed the tinfoil to hold it all together. I don’t get the hype. It’s better than McDonald’s sure but everything is better than that dry processed gunk.
There’s some really amazing burgers from local places that are actually worth the money and cost less than five guys.
Ps the whole thing with the normal burger being the double was confusing too.
Yep.
Just stupidly expensive.
Currently, where I am, I can get a cheaper, and better, burger and fries meal… from a local diner… than from any chain fast food restaurant in the city.
And honestly, in about the same amount of time, as well.
Better is relative in this case. Yes, there are amazing local (typically brewery around me) places, usually but not always at higher price point.
But sometimes that greasy, made the way I want it, perfectly soaked bun is the only thing that will do.
And for consistency in both service and food across any and every location I’ve been in, at this point they are unmatched on their space. For someone with a sensitive stomach, I can eat their burgers without future repercussions - no other fast food can do that. Not even whatabuger.
If I see a 5Guys when traveling it’s like an oasis.
Let me take a page from Democratic advertising geniuses: hey, at least it’s not McDonald’s amirite
Everything is better than McDonald’s. Their patties don’t even resemble a real hamburger anymore.
And, did you raise the food cost, so that everyone can get decent pay? And why not?
Thank you for your service.
5Guys is an institution and no 5Guys slander will be tolerated in our home.
This story does highlight how hard it is to scale bonuses across organizations. Even after knowing the realities of the P&L I fantasize about generating enough extra to windfall people. “If we just had a spare $2m we could…”
… then when you see the math per head, even cutting executive staff, numbers like that turn into a one time $100 distribution which, after tax is like $70.
The game be the game. Quality, Service, Price, pick two.
5Guys is a rare example of hitting all three imo.
High quality ingredients?
Doubtful
Edit: I guess I have to be the bearer of bad news. Five guys is greasey garbage with sugary peanut flavor.
They use fresh beef and peanut oil for their fry oil. They could save a lot of money using frozen patties and soy or canola oil.
Quality is relative. For fast food in America, Five Guys is high cuisine. And, at least from the four or five locations I’ve been to, they’re extremely consistent.
And his wife still thinks he was stupid for that
Murrell joked that he preferred the employees receiving the bonus over his wife getting “a new fur coat”.
“She still looks at me like I’m stupid, but I thought it was worth it,” Murrell was quoted as saying by Fortune. “They worked so hard. They were so overwhelmed.”
I would be surprised if his wife said any of that. It was probably all just said for the interview.
What does that work out to, per capita?
Five Guys has 30,000 employees, so this is $50 each, if it’s split evenly.
Like it will be shared out equally. The fry cook will get 3 cents extra a week.
Once. Not weekly. Unless I misread the news?
300, if divided evenly. Which it surely won’t.
Good. You should be afraid of getting what you deserve. And you still owe your employees a lot more
<ominous>They’re learning…</ominous>
For the mediocre puny sized burgers they sell now, I wouldn’t be put off if they still offed 'em. Disgrace
Five Guys Bourgeoisie & Fries
