A popular burger joint is being flooded with one-star reviews, in what is the second ‘take down’ of a Perth restaurant at the hands of social media in a matter of months.
Regular celeb hang-out Compton Burgers, on Stirling Street in Perth’s CBD, says it is battling an army of trolls after being publicly slammed by one of Australia’s top competitive eaters James Webb on TikTok.
Compton Burgers has been visited by hip-hop artist Coolio, rapper Jack Harlow, and UB40 keyboardist Tony Mullings, but a visit from Webb on Wednesday is bringing some unwanted noise to the eatery.
Webb, who travels Australia and the world creating food content, unleashed on the burger shop in a four-minute TikTok rant.
The 34-year-old from Baulkham Hills in Sydney is Australia’s competitive eating champion, and the top-ranked competitive eater in the Southern Hemisphere. He documents his journey on social media with over 1 million followers on TikTok.
He claimed staff at Compton Burgers heard he was coming to town for a doughnut-eating challenge and reached out to him regarding working together. Webb declined the offer, saying his WA trip was already “booked out”.
Webb went on to say when looking for a coffee, he stumbled across the burger joint only by chance, as it was near a gym he was training at.
He captioned his TikTok video with: “This morning I copped abuse from a disgruntled venue that I didn’t give free promotion to which escalated when they gave me the wrong coffee order (which I paid for).
“Why people think it’s okay to pipe up with expectation and entitlement these days is beyond me. I just wanted a coffee, with almond milk.
“This is not how you treat people. Paying customers. Anyone.”
In the video, Webb says: “This guy (staff) obviously recognised me and proceeded to tell me, ‘you missed out, it’s your loss, we would have made you viral, we would have got you famous, we have got the best food in the country’”.
According to Webb, his coffee did not have the lid on correctly, and when he took a sip it spilled.
He also claimed the coffee was a full-cream milk cappuccino, not an almond milk latte as he had asked for.
Angry with his coffee, Webb then went back into the store, and that’s when the argument began.
In the clip, Webb can be seen in a heated confrontation with staff.
As a result of the viral video, one of the shop’s owners Michael Theo, who features in the argument, claims he has seen an influx of one-star reviews on Google.
“I ordered a large almond milk latte, but instead got attitude and a cappuccino,” one person wrote in their review.
But there were many loyal customers that came to the burger shop’s defence.
“Great place (except if you’re an influencer). Protect small business,” one person said.
“A shame to see the reviews being brigaded because of an influencer. I’ve been here before and the food is fantastic and the staff are awesome. Please don’t believe the reviews of people who have never been here before,” said another.
Shop owner Theo told PerthNow he did reach out to Webb, but the pair did not arrange any work together.
Theo claims Webb did in fact know where the store was and did not stumble on it by chance. He further alleges that Webb only visited the store with the intention to “cause trouble” and make “content out of it”.
“Some people, I can’t say who told him (Webb) that we were unhinged, so he came in here to start something,” Theo said.
Theo claims Webb did in fact order a cappuccino, and staff offered to make him an almond milk latte when he came back into the store.
“He came back in, he was very rude. I was angry at the way he treated me.”
Theo said he was “sick of the influencers” who “try to take family businesses down”.
“You saw what happened with the vegan and that restaurant,” he said.
Theo was referring to the stoush between Perth’s most notorious vegan activist Tash Peterson and Fyre Restaurant, which famously banned vegans.
The chaos started in June when the restaurant owner John Mountain placed a ban on having vegans at his restaurant after a negative review was left by a plant-based eater.
This did not sit well with the vegan community, with Mr Mountain copping a lot of backlash including a pile-on of negative Google reviews.
This caught the attention of Peterson, who staged a number of protests at the restaurant and subsequently earned herself a court date charged with trespassing.
In a statement to PerthNow regarding James Webb’s video, his media team said the incident was “regrettable” and questioned why Compton Burgers treated Webb with hostility.
“Prior to this regrettable incident, there was no awareness on our part that the kiosk had any association with Compton Burgers. Furthermore, there has been no prior collaboration or interaction with Compton Burgers. Although they did proactively reach out to request that he try their food while in town, he was unable to accept their offer due to pre-existing commitments,” the statement reads.
“Given this context, it becomes difficult to understand why the staff at Compton Burgers would treat a paying customer this way and assert that the visit was intended to provoke or create content. Such accusations, without substantiation, raise concerns about their suitability to manage a hospitality business, reflecting a concerning lack of insight into or appreciation for the nature of customer interactions, especially those stemming from random foot traffic.”