Atlanta’s IKEA furniture store outraged many of its Black employees as they attempted to celebrate Juneteenth by offering a special menu in the store’s cafeteria. Employees were sent an e-mail with the menu beforehand that included items such as fried chicken, watermelon, mac and cheese and collard greens, which many employees considered insensitive. Part of the e-mail read that the menu and celebration were to “honor the perseverance of Black Americans and acknowledge the progress yet to be made.”
Because of the menu, many of the employees threatened to quit, and 33 called out on the Juneteenth holiday, Saturday, June 19. The employees called the gesture racially insensitive and ignorant and expressed that management needed to educate themselves more about Black culture and traditions moving forward. They also questioned why no Black employees were a part of the meeting to honor the celebration.
“You cannot say serving watermelon on Juneteenth is a soul food menu when you don’t even know the history. They used to feed slaves watermelon during the slavery time,” one employee told CBS 46. “It caused a lot of people to be upset. People wanted to quit. People weren’t coming back to work. None of the co-workers who sat down to create the menu, nobody was Black.”
The store manager responded to the outrage in another e-mail that stated, in part, “I truly apologize if the menu came off as subjective. It was created with the best of intentions by a few of our coworkers who believed they were representing their culture and tradition with these foods of celebration.”
The workers also claimed that the store only delayed the menu by a day and served the same food with a few changes, adding meatloaf and removing the watermelon, for instance, on Sunday, June 20.
“So they just delayed the Juneteenth menu by a day, thinking that everyone who was upset stayed home on Juneteenth and wouldn’t notice on Sunday, which just added insult to injury,” another IKEA worker told the news station.
The store manager also told CBS 46 that IKEA management realized they messed up with the menu and have apologized.
Watch the news report about the controversy on the next page.
