Intro

On Tuesday 4th May 2021, I decided to place an ad on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter looking for staff for our new location that is opening up soon. I had already tried placing said ad on Gumtree & LinkedIn a week prior and received a sum total of 4 CVs. 

I knew that a bog standard, boring, normal ad would probably yield very few results. Nobody likes boring. Nobody shares the mundane. Nobody engages with normality. So, I approached it from my usual standpoint – causing outrage AKA telling the truth. One of the greatest weapons in an Outrage Marketing arsenal is the truth. While the truth can be told in person, face to face, with little impact, tell it online in the year 2021 and it’s World War Fucking 3. 

Rule 1 of Outrage Marketing Club = Tell The Truth, so that’s what I did. Here is the post:

The reaction was about as immediate as it was divisive. The ideal split in opinion after a post is put up is 50/50. 50% of readers agree with the post, 50% disagree with the post. You then sit back, put the feet up, put a Pina Colada in one hand and a Cuban cigar in the other, let the good people of the inter webs have a cat fight over you while you watch the dollar bills roll in. 

It is rare that you’d reach the perfect 50/50 split (but hopefully some day I will), however, #PUPgate did manage to land somewhere between 80/20 and 85/15, the majority in agreement (unfortunately).

The 15-20% who disagreed were the very people the post targeted, those who can return to work, but choose to sit on their arses and continue to leech off the State. It is important to note at this juncture that I do have sympathy for those who are out of work through no fault of their own and cannot return because their job is simply not operating. I purposely left this bit of information out of the original post as to give full context would cause less outrage. If I had provided more clarity in the post you might be looking at a split of approximately 95/5. How shit would that be? It would almost be a normal post! 

Needless to say the job advert had a fairly decent reach and was picked up by news media as expected. It even made its way to the UK news. The end result was an inbox of 439 CVs as of today, 4 days later. A little better than 4. This means we have a fairly decent pool of applicants, none of whom like to sit around on their arses, available to us to work in our new Moose Bus. It was another success as far as I am concerned. 

It’s Time To Release The Mob!

Not long after my original post went viral, the Twitter mob began to mobilise. Some might refer to these people as radical-left, socialist, millennial, snowflake, cancel-culture ideologues. I like to refer to them simply as ‘the mob’. I personally don’t want to use any words to describe them that could potentially be interpreted as in any way pejorative or derogatory, as this may dissuade them from working for me again. 

Heading up the mob was a lovely girl who I won’t be naming throughout this entire bog post (that’s not a typo, this is a bog – read the home page) for various reasons, one of them being that she might be looking for attention, the second being for purposes of protecting her. I do not want to send people her way to attack her online. She is young and vulnerable and, despite the fact that Paul Stenson is the biggest prick on the island of Ireland, I don’t want to inflict any harm on anyone. For purposes of this bog post, let’s just refer to her as the High Queen. 

The High Queen had one motivation and one motivation alone – she set out to destroy Paul Stenson. I began to like her quite a lot and even saw some of me in her. I might even ask her if she wants a job, but sorry, I digress. One of the ways the High Queen set about taking Paul Stenson down was by trying to find past employees of mine who had dirt on me, and boy did she find dirt. If only it were all reliable, true dirt, but alas, it turned out to be, for the most part, dirt dirt. 

Some WhatsApp messages surfaced in which I was a bit mean. A screen recording of a voice note in which I used the word ‘fucking’ appeared. It was all “vile” and certainly called for me and my business to be immediately cancelled, according to the High Queen and her band of merry mob. At this point I have to stress that everything in these WhatsApp messages was true. I did use the word fucking, but I think it was only once (although I wouldn’t be entirely surprised if it was more than that). The mob really took this word to heart, bless them. All I could think about, as the mob were losing their shit over the word fucking, was that they should never watch Gordon Ramsey in a kitchen. If they thought I was bad, he’d give them a fucking heart attack.   

The High Queen and her associates went out of their way to try and get my attention and make me know that they knew about my use of the word fucking. Rather than engaging, I decided to just sit back and enjoy the soap opera. The microwave was on overdrive there was so much microwaveable popcorn being produced that evening. It was great fun. 

After a bit of Sherlock Holmes work, which took in or around 27 seconds, I managed to decipher which ex employee had leaked these WhatsApp messages to the High Queen. The girl in question had retweeted the High Queens leak tweet, attaching the words “Confirmed I was there” to her retweet. I guess she thought that by saying “she was there”, it would make it seem less likely that I would realise that she was the one who actually leaked the messages. Little did she know how good a detective I was. When I put on My Inspector Gadget coat, there is literally no stoping me.

While I don’t want to reveal this girl’s identity, again to protect her, let’s just call her Mrs D.J. (I’ve heard of Mr D.J., but never Mrs, so this looks like a good opportunity to christen her with that name). She is a D.J. and while the more facetious folk amongst you might say she was looking for attention as a way to boost her D.J. career, I will just say she was going through a very confused part of her life. In a tweet, she mentions that Paul Stenson didn’t allow her to wear her own jacket while she was working in a good truck (typo for food truck I’d imagine).

When you look back at past instagram stories, Mrs D.J. happens to be wearing a jacket whilst working in the good truck. It’s a jacket that could only be described as a beautiful, kaleidoscope of colour. Had I had the foresight to make the White Moose uniforms so kaleidoscopically beautiful, I probably would have. Ours are almost boring in comparison. I guess the moral of the story is that Mrs D.J. may have been telling white (moose) lies in her tweet. Hence why I’d say she was going through a very confused part of her life.

A Letter From Daddy

After getting no reaction out of me over the leaked tweet, High Queen is not happy. She needs more ammunition. She needs something more juicy. She digs deep and comes up with A Letter From Daddy. 

Another ex worker, whose name again I won’t be using, again to protect her, came forward. This time the details were a lot more juicy and exciting. I’m going to refer to this girl as ‘Precious Petal’, but before I tell you any more, please read the below ‘Letter From Daddy’ which her Daddy sent the High Queen to leak online:

I know what you’re thinking. I can read your minds. You’re asking yourself “What’s he going to call Daddy?”. I’m a great believer in going with the first thing that comes into my head, so, for the purposes of this, let’s call him Daddy Cool. 

Daddy Cool gains my respect for his writing skills. Indeed I think he is actually a very talented man. He’d actually be the type of man I’d see winning awards. What I don’t see him winning awards for, however, is giving the full picture. Yes. He is in dire need of up-skilling in that department. 

What Daddy Cool failed to say in his letter about his Precious Petal, is that when he called my buffer of a manager, he threatened to come down to the cafe and smash the place up violently. While he sounds ever so articulate and measured in his writing, he came across as a bit of a fucking nut job over the phone. 

As can be seen in his letter, Daddy Cool seems to be another person who is scoring high points in the confused department. The main point of confusion is that he believed Precious Petal was let go because of Covid. The truth about it, and we know the truth hurts, is that Precious Petal wasn’t laid off because of Covid, Poor Precious Petal was fired. 

Precious Petal was issued with a short service dismissal and this is why she wasn’t given her PUP letter. I’m guessing the reason this wasn’t mentioned in the Letter From Daddy is that his Petal didn’t tell him the truth about the situation. Maybe the confused gene runs in the family? Who knows. 

I did get a good laugh out of reading Daddy’s letter, however. The details were very amusing. I never thought it was possible for me to inherit a business that’s still owned by someone else, but apparently it is. Apparently paying the first week’s wages along with the second week’s wages is ‘stealing’ the first week. Apparently exchanging notes from the till with coins in the tip jar is ‘subsidising the cash float with the tips’. Apparently providing food for our employees from our main kitchen whenever they want to take the breaks that they are legally entitled to (and always get) is ‘refusing to feed them’ and ‘not giving them breaks’. Apparently paying our staff their hours according to the timesheet that is filled out each week which includes the exact number of hours they work is ‘forcing them to work extra hours with no additional wages’. Apparently having CCTV cameras on our premises for the safety and security of people like Precious Petal is ‘spying on our staff’. Apparently featuring staff on social media, in a cafe that is famous worldwide for its social media presence, is a surprise. The confusion goes on and on. I’m going to upgrade the name of the Letter from ‘A Letter from Daddy’ to ‘A Litany of Confusion’. That’s much more appropriate I think. 

As it turns out, we did have a visit from the WRC in early March. The lovely lady went through our highly detailed Policies & Procedures document and examined one staff members SMT (Statement of Main Terms) document in detail. Funnily enough, WRC were happy with their visit and the only thing that was found was that we didn’t stipulate that Sunday premiums were included in the hourly rate of pay. I wonder does this surprise Daddy Cool as much as the fact his little Precious Petal was fired? In any case, I do think a word of thanks is in order for Daddy and Daughter. Not only did they provide me with a great laugh, look at all the juicy content they provided! 

Narky Paul Screenshots

When the High Queen didn’t get much of a reaction from me about the Litany of Confusion Letter, she dug deeper. She started to share several screenshots of private messages between another ex employee of mine and yours truly. In these messages, I am a bit of a prick to be fair. I could easily say that these messages were not sent by me and these screenshots are photoshopped, but I’m going to own this. 

In lockdown 1, I was a terrible prick most days. As I’ve said in several posts, I had some dark days in that period, namely I struggled with my addictions, and they got a hold of me once again. I was a right fucker to this girl in these messages, and I hold my hands up. This is the type of person I am when I let addiction creep back into my life. I’m horrible. So, if this girl is reading, I do apologise for how I came across.

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A post shared by 🇮🇪 PAUL STENSON 🏳️‍🌈 (@paulvstenson)

I am in a better place these days and I believe I am coming close to the best version of myself. I am glad that I was clear headed this week when the mob attacked as a mind full of chaos might have reacted somewhat differently. 

A word of advice for the High Queen Herself 

Firstly, thank you for all your coverage of my brand over the past week. It does mean a lot. However, while you and your band of merry mob have been most productive in your publicising of the Mighty Moose, in future I would urge you to get the full picture before you share a one-sided story online. Remember, while you do despise me and you might want to ‘cancel’ the cafe, just bear in mind that there are several people in gainful employment in my cafe. They provide for their families. They put bread and milk on the table by working in our business.

I totally get that some people, particularly the Irish, hate seeing people become successful. Begrudgery is deeply embedded in our culture. Another successful person with a large following that you target may have named you and set their followers on you. Someone else may have tried to sue you for defamation. This isn’t and never will be my vibe and I do understand that others can fuck up just as much as I do!

So, while I appreciate all the content you have given me, and all the amazing mob members you have sent my way, next time round remember that the material you are being sent may not be as factual as you might think, and sharing it online may be a little dangerous! 

I’ve nothing against you and would even buy you a coffee if you came to the Moose (along with your free Kleenex of course!)

Much love,

Paulie x