She Stole My 500 Clients,I Smiled and Handed Her My Empire

It was the third month I'd been ordering diet meals for my coworkers, and the customer count had climbed past five hundred.

Every day at noon, my father had five hundred portions delivered like clockwork.

A few staff members split them up floor by floor, making sure everyone had food in front of them within ten minutes.

My coworker Quinn Gable had been eyeing my little operation with envy. She bought one of the meals, snapped a photo, and posted it to the group chat.

"A few leaves of lettuce, a couple scraps of meat, and a handful of dead shrimp. No way this is worth $29.90."

Then she dropped in a string of stock photos. "I made these myself. They look amazing, smell amazing, taste amazing, and they're only $8.80."

Right after that, she posted an order flyer to the group.

The fine print read: twenty percent off the first week, plus a free side of deli meats.

In an instant, all five hundred coworkers canceled their meals for the next day.

I let out a long breath.

I'd finally tossed away the money-losing hot potato.

——

The group chat wouldn't stop buzzing.

"Oh my God, when you compare them side by side, $29.90 for one of hers is so overpriced."

"Quinn's is only $8.80, and honestly it looks way better than hers."

The ones talking were Betty Chavez and Kathy Fox from HR.

Those two I remembered well.

Every single meal order came with a note from them, demanding double meat, extra shrimp, extra veggies.

For the sake of being coworkers, I never made an issue of it.

Every time, I told the kitchen to pack theirs in the larger containers.

And now they were the first ones to stab me in the back.

"$29.90, and she actually has the nerve. The cost is probably only three or four bucks. Who knows what she's doing with all that dirty money."

Seeing people back her up, Quinn got bolder.

She came right out and accused me in the group of profiting off filth.

I stared at the messages flooding the screen.

I didn't argue back.

Bringing diet meals for my coworkers had started by pure accident.

I held myself to strict standards about staying in shape.

But my mom worried I'd hurt my health dieting too hard.

So she hired a nutritionist just to plan out diet meals for me.

My coworker Mia Whitney, who sat next to me, saw them and begged me to grab her one too.

I figured we were coworkers, so a small favor was no big deal.

What I didn't expect was that once Mia started spreading the word, more and more coworkers came to me asking me to order diet meals for them.

The company was far from the city center, and the only options downstairs were a few hole-in-the-wall places with terrible food.

I'm soft when it comes to saying no, and I couldn't bring myself to turn down my coworkers.

So I had my father hire a few chefs specifically for it.

I used only the best ingredients, and every meal's balance was calculated by the nutritionist.

All the costs added up to at least $50 a portion.

But given what my coworkers earned, I priced each one at $29.90, just enough to cover the delivery driver and the staff who handed them out.

After three months of it, I'd sunk over $20,000 into the whole thing.

So today, the moment I saw Quinn going after me in the group chat?

I was thrilled.

"You can tell at a glance she's using lymph-node meat and frozen dead shrimp. That salad dressing is an unnatural color, definitely loaded with additives."

"Forget whether it even helps you lose weight. Eat that long-term and you'll have serious problems."

To make everyone believe her, she shared several articles in the group about the health dangers of lymph-node meat and zombie shrimp.

"I've been disgusted by this for a while. I kept quiet because we're all coworkers, but for everyone's sake, I had to speak up."

"I don't care whether you order my diet meals or not, but please, stop poisoning your bodies."

"I'm not trying to steal Fay Fox's business. I'm just a struggling mom. Making diet meals for everyone solves the lunch problem and helps me put a little extra toward the bills."

Quinn was playing the struggling-mom card, tugging at everyone's heartstrings.

"You can rest easy about the quality of my meals. I make baby food all the time. Food quality and safety are absolutely up to standard."

Plenty of people looking for a bargain chimed in to agree with her.