A Popeyes restaurant in Memphis, Tennessee, temporarily closed its doors for cleaning after a former employee’s viral video apparently showed roaches in the kitchen, WREG reported.
Tykeia Ransom alleged her manager fired her because of videos she had recorded and posted on TikTok. One video apparently showed roaches inside the restaurant, while another captured a dispute between the manager and a customer, according to the outlet.
The Shelby County health department performed a health inspection recently and gave the restaurant a score of 98, per WREG. But Ransom claimed, “[Roaches are] everywhere and all in the food you know and everything you can think of. All in the rice.”
Ransom, who had worked at the restaurant for two months, said she reported the roach problem to her manager multiple times, WREG noted. However, Ransom said the manager reportedly wanted to continue selling the food.
“She didn’t even want to throw the rice away, like ‘this is product’,” Ransom said. “And I was like, ‘okay so what, you want me to sell the roach stuff?’” (RELATED: ’10 Dead Roaches’: Florida Red Lobster Ordered To Close After Multiple Health Violations)
In response, Popeyes issued an email statement to WREG acknowledging that “absolutely nothing about the condition of the restaurant in this video is acceptable.” The restaurant will be “thoroughly cleaned,” and the staff will be “retrained on proper procedures” before reopening, the statement added, per WREG.
Ransom said she did not want her job back and called Popeyes “the rudest company [she] ever worked for,” the outlet noted.