Today we have kind of a head scratcher of a story out of Austin, Texas. According to the Washington Post, Pastor Jordan Brown of Austin’s Church of Open Doors, an openly gay man, ordered a cake from the Whole Foods flagship store. The custom cake was supposed to say “Love Wins” across the top. Easy peasy, right?
Well, things went a little sideways after Mr. Brown got the cake to his car. In a YouTube video, he says he looked at the cake and noticed that it had more words than he ordered. The cake said “Love Wins F-g.” Mr. Brown was understandably upset that a Whole Foods employee would add such an offensive slur to his cake.
Whole Foods initially offered to replace the cake and give Mr. Brown a gift card for his trouble. But then things got weird. After talking to the employee responsible for the cake and looking at some security video footage, Whole Foods denied that anyone in their store added the slur. At that point Mr. Brown retained counsel and sued the store.
Now Whole Foods is suing Mr. Brown right back. The store released a statement saying that, as a matter of policy, they don’t accept or create offensive cake designs. Moreover, the employee who worked on Mr. Brown’s cake is a member of the LGBTQ community. Finally, in store security video, the cake box has the UPC label on the top, but in images provided by Mr Brown, the UPC label is clearly on the side of the box. Mr. Brown had complete control of the cake after purchase, so if anyone was moving stickers around the box it was… dun dun duuuunnnn: Old Man Stevens from the haunted amusement park! No, wait, that’s Scooby Doo — Whole Foods thinks Mr. Brown tampered with his own cake.
(I’m just waiting for the cake to hire its own lawyers and sue everyone for using it for nefarious purposes. Everyone knows that cake is in the universe to make us happy. It shouldn’t be a vehicle for strife. Stop abusing cake!)
At this point, it’s unclear what exactly happened, but the crack minds in the YouTube comments on Mr. Brown’s video are as skeptical of his claims as Whole Foods’ legal team are. Some are questioning how he could have made it out of the store without reading the cake, which was clearly visible through the cellophane window on the box. Others, who have expertise in cake decorating, are pointing out irregularities in the writing.
Why anyone would think to commit cake fraud is beyond me, but anything is possible. Stay tuned to see how The Case of the Great Gay Cake Caper resolves!
