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A customer told me my sausage links looked like sad little slugs | Butchers - Talk Freely

A customer told me my sausage links looked like sad little slugs

This older guy came into the shop last month, pointed at my display case, and said, 'Son, those links look like sad little slugs someone stepped on.' I was making them too short and fat, about 2 inches long, and the casings were wrinkly. I took it to heart and watched a few videos from a German butcher on YouTube. I switched to natural sheep casings, started making them a proper 5 inches long, and got my twist technique way tighter. Now they look uniform and plump, and they sell twice as fast. Has anyone else gotten a piece of blunt feedback that actually improved your work?

3 comments

3 Comments

piper_reed6mo ago

Honestly, that's kind of a harsh way to give advice, but man, it worked. Sometimes you just need that one clear picture, like "sad slugs," to really see the problem. I get what @the_logan is saying about selling them for a month, but sometimes you're just too close to your own work to notice. A blunt comment from a stranger can cut through all that. It's not always fun to hear, but it forces you to look at things fresh and make real changes.

the_logan6mo ago

Wait, you were selling those sad slug sausages for a whole month?

caseym485mo ago

Honestly, that's the thing about being stuck in your own little world with a product. You start to normalize things that are actually pretty messed up. Like, after a month of looking at those sausages every day, your brain just goes "yep, this is fine, this is what food looks like." It takes an outsider to slap you with the reality check that you've been peddling something that looks like a deflated slug on a bun. Piper's point about needing that harsh picture is spot on because a gentle nudge just doesn't cut it when you've been in denial for a whole month.