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Burger King UK felt the wrath of social media on Monday morning.
The fast-food chain kicked off International Women’s Day by tweeting out “women belong in the kitchen” in a marketing ploy gone wrong.
Women belong in the kitchen.
— Burger King (@BurgerKingUK) March 8, 2021
BK explained they were attempting to shed light on the fact that “only 20% of chefs are women” and went on to announced several scholarship funds designed to “help female Burger King employees pursue their culinary dreams”.
We’re on a mission to change the gender ratio in the restaurant industry by empowering female employees with the opportunity to pursue a culinary career.”
If they want to, of course. Yet only 20% of chefs are women. We're on a mission to change the gender ratio in the restaurant industry by empowering female employees with the opportunity to pursue a culinary career. #IWD
— Burger King (@BurgerKingUK) March 8, 2021
We are proud to be launching a new scholarship programme which will help female Burger King employees pursue their culinary dreams!
— Burger King (@BurgerKingUK) March 8, 2021
The Burger King UK Twitter account went on to defend their tweet because they felt it drew attention to a “huge lack of female representation in our industry.”
Why would we delete a tweet that’s drawing attention to a huge lack of female representation in our industry, we thought you’d be on board with this as well? We've launched a scholarship to help give more of our female employees the chance to pursue a culinary career.
— Burger King (@BurgerKingUK) March 8, 2021
People thought BK’s publicity stunt did not help women’s causes and blasted them for it.
Burger King really wanted those impressions eh? pic.twitter.com/tFYAHHoxEH
— Jake Lucky (@JakeSucky) March 8, 2021
the people defending Burger King be like “genius marketing play” ah yes apparently appealing to a bunch of misogynist 13 year old boys is some smart marketing play
— JustNathan (@JustNathanTV) March 8, 2021
This had to be the worst idea by the Burger King marketing team 💀 why open it up like that????? Look at the like ratio for the replies omg 😭 pic.twitter.com/IjI5QltKNC
— 𝙎𝙮𝙣𝙘 | 𝙒𝙖𝙩𝙘𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 Ghibli Films on Repeat (@Sync_xma) March 8, 2021
Burger king used misogyny as a clickbait. Nothing draws twitter users attention faster than this. Genius advert🤲
— kevin🍑 (@kevin__k9) March 8, 2021
That burger king tweet is already being loaded into social media decks as an example of what not to do. History being made in real time.
— Froskurinn (@Froskurinn) March 8, 2021