Crazy Pedro’s publicly calls out influencer asking for a free meal

Crazy Pedro’s has publicly slammed an Instagram influencer after she asked for free food and drinks, urging her and other influencers to ‘read the room.’

The late-night pizza parlour, which is famed across the North West for its unique pizza toppings and vast tequila and mezcal selection, took to Instagram yesterday to share a direct message they’d received from an influencer on the app.

The influencer, whose identity was omitted in the screenshot, wrote cheerily: “Hey guys! Me and my boyfriend… are coming up to Manchester on Sunday – Wednesday & we were wondering if you’d be interested in doing a collaboration?

@manc.wanderer / Instagram

“We’d be happy with doing feed posts & of course many stories of your yummy food.”

This message came as the Crazy Pedro’s Bridge Street venue had to temporarily close earlier this week because of staff being told to self-isolate.

And, like all the other hospitality venues across the country, Pedro’s three sites have been closed for the best part of a year thanks to the Covid-19 pandemic.

So, as you can imagine, they were less than impressed with the polite request and, rather than reply directly, they decided to share it with their followers with a stern message for other influencers expecting freebies during these difficult times.

@crazypedros / Instagram

Sharing a screenshot of the message, they wrote on Instagram: “READ THE ROOM. We’ve been open 4/5 months tops out of the last 14 and just last week closed one of our venues in the interest of staff and customers safety – whilst you’re out here after a bit of free food?

“We’re all for a bit of promotion so why not pay us a visit and shout about our ‘yummy food’ along with every other venue you’ve probably copy and pasted the message to?

“It’s a no from us unfortunately but we’ll save you a table should you wish to join us as a paying customer. Team Ped’s X”

@crazypedros / Instagram

After their post blew up online, a Pedro’s spokesperson added: “There are some top people and pages that do very good things for venues and the food scene – we are ALL about them.

“If people take the time to research what we’re all about and approach us – we’d consider for sure, but it would have taken two minutes to see we’re one site down and we’re in a pickle and now probably isn’t the best time.”

This isn’t the first time that local operators have had to publicly post their views of influencer requests -former MasterChef champion and local restaurant owner, Simon Wood, took to Twitter to politely ask them to ‘get in the bin’ earlier this year.

Crazy Pedro’s have now reopened their Bridge Street site, which will be operating between the shortened hours of midday to midnight.