Voahangy Rasetarinera, San Jose bakery owner of the Giving Pies left high and dry by Tesla after the corporate requests to doubles order only to cancel at the last minute after small business owner has committed to the job and outlayed expenses, as she now seeks compensation.
The travails of being a small business owner… A California caterer has been left high and dry after electric car manufacturer, Tesla cancelled a $16,000 pie order at the last minute, leaving the San Jose baker out on expenses, including the cost of buying extra ingredients and worker’s salaries.
What started as a $16,000 deal ended up costing the small business owner, Voahangy Rasetarinera, thousands of dollars instead, nevermind the lost contract.
It all began earlier this month, when Rasetarinera, the owner of The Giving Pies in San Jose’s Willow Glen neighborhood received a call from a representative with Tesla asking the baker to cater thousands of mini-pies for a Black History Month event.
‘Can we double the order?’
Rasetarinera, who started the business out of her home in 2017, says both sides agreed on a quote and exchanged an invoice for 4,000 pies for delivery this week. Because of the tight turnaround, Rasetarinera asked staff to work extra hours, she bought ingredients and packaging supplies and declined at least three other catering jobs.
Rasetarinera sent Tesla a quote, which the company rep approved, she said.
But Tesla’s vendor did not send payment.
The next day, Rasetarinera said she inquired with Tesla about the lack of payment.
‘She said, ‘Oh, I’m so sorry that vendor hadn’t paid you yet, I think they’re kind of new,” Rasetarinera told NBC BayArea.
‘And I have a question for you, can we double the order?’
Rasetarinera agreed, reasoning, ‘I’m like, ‘Okay, I’m gonna wait, you know, and they are professional, they are a big company. So once it’s approved, it’s approved.”
‘Sorry change of plans, got to cancel, have a good life, bye!’
To accommodate the large order, Rasetarinera’s staff had to work around the clock to complete the job.
But two days after taking the Tesla job, the bakery owner got a text message canceling the order.
Read the text; ‘It unfortunately sounds like we will be changing plans and will not be needing this order. Thank you so much for your support I appreciate it.’
That’s when Rasetarinera’s world turned upside down, forced to reckon what any small business owner hopes they never have to deal with but increasingly are forced to find make way solutions for.
‘It felt like we didn’t matter,’ Rasetarinera said. ‘It felt like, ‘OK, it’s no big deal, it’s just a business transaction that didn’t pan out.’ But it’s not like that. I had to tell my staff change your plans.’
Rasetarinera said that her business suffered a loss in the thousands of dollars as a result of the last-minute cancellation.
Rethinking corporate policy
‘This abrupt reversal left me reeling, realizing the extent of the impact on my small business,’ Rasetarinera wrote on her Facebook page.
‘I had invested time, resources, and effort based on assurances from Tesla, only to be left high and dry.’
When she inquired with Tesla about the cancellation, she was told the decision came from upper management.
The ‘attempt to shift blame to upper management only compounded the betrayal I felt,’ she said.
‘To me, it was clear that Tesla’s corporate culture prioritized convenience over accountability, disregarding the livelihoods of small business owners like myself,’ she wrote on her Facebook page.
Rasetarinera says she’s done similar big jobs in the past with no trouble, from weddings and companies for a variety of corporate vendors, including, Google, Apple and Adobe.
She has a cancellation policy, but because Tesla hadn’t paid her yet, there was no way to recoup expenses.
Efforts to reach out to Tesla to ask about what went wrong with the catering deal and whether or not the company will compensate the bakery in any way for its time and expenses had yet to lead to a response.
Rasetarinera is now revaluating how she does business with larger corporations.
