Products or business you refuse to patron
 

What products do you refuse to buy or businesses you refuse to patron because of a political or personal desire not to let ______ get your money.

For example, some people hate Walmart and refuse to shop there. Some people refuse to buy (French wine), or any gas from Exxon, or what ever.

I refuse to buy any cheesesteaks made outside out of the Philadelphia Metropolitan Area. :)

I have heard those Phily guys are pretty rabid about what actually goes into one and how they are made. I saw a thing on CNN once where somebody was trying to get a paton on the name "Phily Cheesesteak".

A cheesesteak is almost like a sacrament...something to be admired, worshipped and consumed with trepidation and joy.

I don't hate folks outside Philly that make 'em, but they just don't get it. It's something that just can't be recreated willy-nilly.

Wow, I just had a vision of a cheesesteak communion wafer!

Toshiba Laptops.

Perkins Family Restaurants.

Olive Garden.

I refuse to patronize plenty of places because they suck... but nothing for political reasons.

Amen!

Eggs from battery farms.

I've grown to dislike various companies mostly for anti-consumer attitudes, so I tend to avoid them. But nothing with any kind of religious fervor.

For example, it really bugged me several years ago when S0NY introduced their memory stick when there was clearly an industry standard of compact flash. In hindsight, I realize it's kind of silly, because there have always been format wars of one variety or another, but it seemed so clearly wrong of them to do that. They made a conscious decision to hurt the consumer in order to maximize profits. I think they fragmented the memory card market and now everybody has their own kind of cards. Nothing is standardized, and the consumer loses. I haven't purchased any of their products since. Mainly because it left a bad taste in my mouth. But if they made a product that was worthwhile, I'd probably buy it. I stand limply by my convictions.

I'm probably gonna get thrown outta here for this but - and I spent a few years in Philly - I could NOT get used to them using *gulp* Cheese Whiz. I mean for the love of all that is good and Holy - Why would you screw up an otherwise heavenly dish with -Ulp- Cheese Whiz????

And while I'm at it (may as well go out in flaming glory) - the other annoying thing they would do is when they added the Pepperoncini - it would be full of stems n' stuff - inedible stems. There was no option - I had to pick 'em out one by one [/Monk].

Ok, I'm cleaning out my desk. And ducking. :thepain:

:)

Is it just me, or does Cheese Whiz sound like a potential concern for the uncircumcized with poor hygiene habits?

I hated Whiz on my steak...I think I had it twice while I lived there. White American for me...of course, I also added un-Philly items like catsup and mayo. That's because I'm a bizarre fuck.

That's trivial shit though...plenty of folks will disagree over little stuff like cheese or peppers or onions. I'm primarily hating on places like Arby's or Subway trying to make some concoction and calling it a Philly Cheese steak. And the sad thing is, they're never very good.

Although, I think McDonald's had one about 2 years ago that they actually sold in Philadelphia. It was okay, but nowhere near like the real thing.

I still don't understand that. I mean, the stems are softened a little by the brine, but wtf?

I don't understand what's not to understand. I spit out the pepperocini stems too. In fact, almost *died* once, I grasped the stem, put the pepper in my mouth halfway, bit it clean through and in the act of swallowing the damn pepper, I got a spoonful of the vinegar/pickling/brine/poison down the wrong pipe. I could hear it sizzling in the bottoms of my lungs as my diaphram strained to turn my lungs into external organs. I felt like I'd just beer-bonged a drum of Judge Doom's Dip. I thought I was gonna die, and I was afraid I wouldn't. Gawd.

Inedible. Understatement of the week. Sheesh.

I was not clear. I don't understand why they don't cut the stems off. I don't like the stems either.

There are cheese steaks made outside of the Philadelphia Metro Area?

I thought those were just poor imitations of heaven on a hard roll.

Dang.

CheezeWiz...? You kidding me? :whofart: That is nasty.

Now back to your regular program. Remember when V-8 had the add with a guy in laundry mat kicking shit around? Which BTW is Cambells. I sent an email and have not a clue if helped, but it's been gone.

Wait! I take it back! There's a well-known restaurant here in town that all of my friends and I avoided in high school because the proprietor was a wifebeater (friend's mom ran a battered women's shelter; so much for confidentiality.)

Your right. The funniest thing to me is the two most famous cheese steak emporiums, the ones that draw visiting tourists and politicians for photo ops, suck.

There's thousands of little Mom & Pop hoagie (sandwich) shops in the greater Philly area, that make good to fantastic cheese steaks. Small variations breed fierce loyalty in different neighborhood shops, but that said, they're ALL better than the big two.

PS...walmart is evil.

Ok, I don't buy anything made in France. At least when I know that it is made there.

I agree on the Cheese Whiz. I personally prefer provolone on mine. It's a good Italian cheese, which seems like it'd perfectly in character with the origins of the cheesesteak.

I boycott all things Dick Smith!

I wont shop at one of the local pet shops...coz they blow.

I wont eat at Cellar47, which is a very up market restaurant here because I got food poisoning there.....twice!!!

I despise Applebee's, and not just because their food sucks...

A friend of my mother's used to run this wonderful brew"pub" several years back. They were one-of-a-kind in that area, and always packed--great beers, with some of the best food in town. It was the first place I'd been to that paired craft brews with nice cuisine.

Then, Applebee's came sniffing around, and noticed the name of the brewpub was similar to that of a small chain they'd just acquired elsewhere. They wanted to open franchises in the area, so they sued the owner for the name and eventually won. The guy changed the name, but the lawsuit had wiped him out and he closed soon after.

Applebee's never did open any of the franchises, and they sold off the chain, too. Corporate vampire bastards. And their food sucks.

Preach on, Brother Bruce!

I try to avoid Wal-Mart if I can, along with Microsoft...because I just don't like either company. But I don't go out of my way...both the computers we own run on XP, and the T-shirt I have on is from Wal-Mart.

I don't refrain from buying from products or businesses for moral or ethical reasons. I also don't buy things for moral or ethical reasons.

Do you have an American/English dictionary? Many (most) of the words in it were made there...

Sony is all about the proprietary for no reason at all. It goes back all the way to custom speaker connectors on their receivers, and forward all the way to those DRM'd CDs that rootkitted your computer.

You would have thought they learned with Betamax.

Yea, yea, I know. Our history is intertwined. They helped us, we helped them. And in France most people speak english because if it wasn't for us they would no longer be speaking French but some mix of French and German. I am glad for them that they have had the choice to keep speaking French without the harshness of a Germanic dialect.

I refuse to buy anything from any company that:
* Telemarkets during dinner.
* Sends me email spam unless I have given my permission.
* Gives my personal details to third parties for their own profit but won't tell me who those third parties are.

I also refuse to enter into any contracts that requires me to pay out the balance of any contract if I need to terminate the contract for any reason. If that is the only sort of contract the company offers, then I take my business elsewhere.

Wal-Mart SUX!!! K-Mart much better quality, and the prices are about the same. Now that K-Mart and Sears are together I can get crafstman tools with out fighting the mall.