Sticking it to foreigners – ice cream company backs down after “Thais only” promotion

An ice cream company operating at the newly opened Icon Siam in Bangkok was forced to issue a grovelling apology after they started a promotion that excluded foreigners.

Stickhouse – that sells specialist Italian gelato ice-cream on a stick – had a sign that said “For Thai Customers Only”.

Thais were lucky to get 50% off their second treat in the promotion.

But now the company has told Thaivisa that it was all a terrible mistake. Here is their apology in full:

To Our Valued Customers,

To celebrate the launch of our ICONSIAM location, we decided to offer a “buy 1, get 50% off your 2nd gelato” promotion. The promotion banner was printed in Thai because well, we’re located in Thailand. Please keep in mind, local patrons make up almost 95% of our business. Most of whom, Thai is their native language. 

It wasn’t until it was recently brought to our attention that our promotion banner had been altered that we realized the mistake of our communication to our staff. We had hoped to appeal to “locals” (see: residents of the area) but the promotion was always intended to be open to all patrons. 

While this promotion was meant to end on December 15th, given recent events, we will be extending it through January. If you were personally refused the promotion at our ICONSIAM location, we sincerely apologize and ask you to please contact us directly and your next visit is on us. 

Staff will be vigorously retrained to ensure there are no additional miscommunications and we look forward to providing you a level of service and product that we can be proud of. 

Thai Visa

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