Recently, those who ordered plus-size clothing from Forever 21 are complaining that they received Atkins low-carb lemon diet bars with their shipped order. Imagine opening your box of fab fashion, only to find something you didn't order. Would you be pleasantly surprised or offended?
It all started with a viral tweet, with the caption: "My mom ordered some clothes from Forever 21‘s plus size collection and they sent a Atkins diet bar along with the stuff she ordered."
Several others proceeded to make public their dissatisfaction with Forever 21 for allegedly targeting and shaming them.
The tweets received a variety of responses on Twitter, with some agreeing that this was a tone-deaf move. "Send. It. Back. With the stupid diet bar!!," wrote one social media user, while another corroborated "But there are still people who deal with eating disorders, are recovering, or deal with body dysmorphia and a brand this big shouldn’t be sending out this kind of message."
Others thought it wasn't a big deal, especially because they claim that Forever 21 gave the bars to all customers, regardless of what they ordered online.
One response read: "They’ve sent chocolate bars and Gillette razors with orders as well. This is not a big deal." Another said: "They send these to everyone... everyone who is offended now would be JUST as offended if they didnt receive these and everyone else did [sic]."
Watch this video of a model who wants to reclaim the word "fat":Since social media has blown up, Forever 21 has confirmed that this is, in fact, true in a statement they gave to Jezebel:
"From time to time, Forever 21 surprises our customers with free test products from third parties in their e-commerce orders. The freebie items in question were included in all online orders, across all sizes and categories, for a limited time and have since been removed.
"This was an oversight on our part and we sincerely apologize for any offense this may have caused to our customers, as this was not our intention in any way."
Well, what do you think? How would you feel if you received this diet bar with your clothing shipment?