About

Applebee's (often referred to as Crapplebee's in satire) is an American restaurant franchise chain, founded in 1980 and specializing in traditional American food like hamburgers, steak, pasta, and a signature dish they call "riblets." Applebee's is often referred to online, especially by shitposters, as a synonym for the low-quality of mainstream American food and culture.

History

Applebee's was founded in 1980 in Decatur, Georgia, by Bill and TJ Palmer. By October, 2015, the chain had 2,003 locations, located mostly in suburban America, and 28,000 employees.^[1] Applebee's commercials are a staple of American television, and frequently depict a group of young people enjoying a meal while a voice-over explains the new food or promotion; the close-up shots of glistening food recur throughout the oeuvre.^[2]

Satires of Applebee's first became popular in the late 1990s. An early example was featured in the film Office Space, which featured a parody version of Applebee's named Chotchkie's.^[3] Many popular scenes from the film take place inside Chotchkie's.

Applebee's Boycott

On January 29th, 2013, Saint Louis resident and Applebee's waitress Chelsea Welch, also known as "gateflan" on Reddit, submitted a photograph to /r/atheism in a post titled "My mistake sir, I’m sure Jesus will pay for my rent and groceries," showing a receipt that a customer had left for another server at the restaurant. Along with the customer's signature, a note on the receipt read “I give God 10%, why do you get 18,” referring to the automatic 18% gratuity added on to parties of 8 or more. In the comments, Welch explained that the receipt was issued for a table of 20 people who all asked for separate checks to avoid the automatic gratuity. The post received 12,861 upvotes and 3599 points overall.

Anti-Fandom

On May 29th, 2013, a post was submitted to shitposting subreddit /r/circlejerk titled "If this gets 2,000 upvotes, /r/circlejerk will be an applebees themed subreddit."^[4] The post received only one upvote; however, on October 4th, 2015, another Applebee's themed post was created, titled "Oh no! John Cena and Bernie Sanders were just banned from eating at all Applebee's locations! If this post gets 2000 upberns, /r/circlejerk will become an anti-Applebee's subreddit." This post, created by user BarbatisCollum, had received 3,425 points (95% upvoted) as of October 13th, 2015, but the subreddit had been themed "Anti-Applebee's" by October 5th, and users began creating many Applebee's themed posts.

The theme spread to other shitposting forums, including Tumblr^[7] the popular Facebook shitposting community called "I play KORN to my DMT plants, smoke blunts all day & do sex stuff."^[8] As of October 13th, there are over 375 posts on /r/circlejerk relating to Applebee's.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References