You’re hosting Thanksgiving this year. You wake up happy and rested because you did your due diligence and put in time (and money) beforehand to pre-order your family’s Thanksgiving meal. If you happened to pre-order your meal from Boston Market in Rancho Cucamonga, CA, you walked up to the entrance to receive a rude awakening.

From the Los Angeles Daily News:

Customers who showed up at Boston Market on Foothill Boulevard in Rancho Cucamonga to pick up their prepaid meals on a blustery Thanksgiving morning were in for a shock.

The doors to the restaurant were closed. A sign outside read: “No employees showing up today… we are unable to fulfill the orders! We are sorry!”

Boston Market is investigating why that happened, company spokesman Slaton Smith said in a statement.

“We are in the process of refunding the Thanksgiving order(s) of every guest impacted by our Rancho Cucamonga location. We sincerely apologize to every guest who placed an order and came to the restaurant today,” he wrote.

This must have made for a most un-Happy Thanksgiving for these customers.

Boston Market is a franchiser, so they are stepping up to cover these losses—but it will ultimately be taken out of the backside of the franchisee, who is the one responsible for ensuring they are fully staffed and ready to go. If the staff doesn’t show up, it’s their responsibility to at least complete those orders. Whatever the reason, it is not a good reflection of responsible business ownership. What it is reflecting is the general malaise that Americans are feeling right now.

Part and parcel of Biden’s America, as a CBS/YouGov poll reveals:

While the CBS News/YouGov poll pegs Biden’s job approval rating at 44 percent, which is higher than some other recent surveys, it also shows that he gets negative scores for his handling of inflation (67 percent), immigration (64 percent), the economy (61 percent), foreign policy (58 percent), and race relations (56 percent).

Biden is in positive territory for his distribution of the coronavirus vaccine — 53 percent.

Asked how they thought things were going in America, 70 percent say “somewhat” or “very badly,” while only 30 percent opt for “very” or “somewhat well.”

On the nation’s economy, the poll said 64 percent went with “fairly” or “very bad,” as opposed to the 30 percent who say it’s “very” or “fairly good.”

And who knows how much staff that Rancho Cucamonga franchisee had at all thanks to AB5, California’s attack on independent professionals and small businesses, including franchisees. Filling any retail or food service job has become difficult lately, but especially difficult with the looming threat of misclassification complaints and the requisite penalties. Biden and Co. hope to take this local misery national with the PRO Act, which has the same draconian ABC Test that targets franchise operations as much as independent professionals.

The same Grinch that stole livelihoods in California may have helped to rob the joy from people’s Thanksgiving Day celebrations. Needless to say, those Rancho Cucamonga customers were not happy.

Rancho Cucamonga resident Joseph Amato called the situation “pretty disappointing.” He preordered his meal last week and came to the store at 9:45 a.m. Thursday to pick it up.

“No email, nothing about anything,” Amato said. “And there’s food sitting in there, food sitting in the truck on the side, just waiting to see if someone shows up. Now it’s just everyone out here without food.

“I was really hoping to take it easy this Thanksgiving, not have to make a whole dinner for the family,” he said. “Now I have to find a Plan B.”

Let’s hope these customers, like Mr. Amato, did find their Plan B and ultimately had a happier Thanksgiving. Boston Market’s reputation has taken an unfortunate hit. and as long as Biden’s inflation and economy continue, we’ll be taking more hits too.

Let’s Go, Brandon!