I'll be completely honest here, I too can't go without my daily coffee. And yes, I do spend probably 1/4 of my week in a Dunkin' Donuts drive thru when I'm not there at 6 AM making your coffees. Believe me, I get it. You can't get through the rainy Monday mornings or any day, for that matter, without your cup of joe. BUT, are you one of those morning regulars that are driving the employees crazy?! The results are in and the employees at Dunkin' Donuts' around the country have spoken. Here's what they had to say about what goes on in their locations every day:
1. The Overall Experience
Depending on whether or not you come in or go to drive thru will get you a completely different DD experience. You see, our drive thru is on a timer and if you're in our drive thru line for longer than two and a half minutes, we could get in trouble with our boss and sometimes even corporate.
2. Come inside if you want more than a coffee.
If you want to have a conversation and order $37 worth of food, I suggest coming inside. Drive thru is for speed and convenience-- nothing else. Be courteous and have your wallet ready and know what you want before driving up to the speaker, please.
3. Be prepared.
In addition, know what you want. Nothing is more irritating than a van full of people sitting at the drive thru speaker running up our timer because you don't know if you want a sandwich or a donut. Preparedness, folks.
4. We aren't stupid.
Don't treat us like we're dumb and incompetent. Nothing is more irritating than someone coming through and talking to us like we're five because we work at DD. If it wasn't for us. you wouldn't be getting your beloved latte, so maybe be a little nicer to the people that are in charge of making or breaking your Monday morning.
5. We run out of things.
Yes, shocking I know. But every morning we only get a certain amount of bagels and donuts. If you want something particular and can't live without it, get up earlier. By 2 PM, I can almost guarantee we'll be out of chocolate creme.
6. Stay off your phone while ordering.
Nothing is more ignorant than serving someone who isn't even paying attention to you because they're on the phone. You can't complain that your order wasn't right when you aren't even paying attention when we read you back your order. It's your own fault for not listening.
7. Don't light/smoke your cigarette in the drive thru.
I am not trying to inhale cigarette smoke while you count your change or look for your card. Just be considerate of the non-smokers around you and don't light it until you're out of the drive thru.
8. Do not order a box of joe in the drive thru.
A box of joe takes roughly 6 minutes to make if we don't have an extra two coffee pots to spare. Especially in the morning rush, we barely have enough coffee to keep up with drive thru. So please, come inside where we can take the 6 minutes to serve you and help out our drive thru timer.
9. People make mistakes.
Everything is remake-able. So don't be rude if the new employee accidentally made you an iced coffee instead of an iced latte. We're human, we make mistakes too. Just hand it back and politely ask for it to be fixed. It costs you nothing, and we won't mind if you're polite about it!
10. Regulars.
We love our regulars that we get to see every day. We love our customers in general and we worry if we don't see "medium hot regular with a senior" before 11 AM! We look forward to serving you, and helping you start your day!
So now you're aware of the hidden secrets and pet peeves the employees at your local DD go through on the reg. You can officially consider yourself an educated Dunkin' lover.
Go enjoy your coffee and donut, and come back tomorrow! Be kind, and you'll be surprise as the change in services you receive! Be nice to the people serving you, and maybe your coffee won't be "wrong" every morning.
