“The Napa Valley Wine Train was 100 percent wrong in its handling of this issue”, Napa Valley Wine Train Inc. chief executive officer Anthony Giaccio said in the news release. But the woman who brought the mid-ride expulsion to light remained unmoved.
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“In summary, we were accurately insensitive to you and the members of the Book Club”. PR consultant Sam Singer, has been hired as a spokesperson for the Napa Valley Wine Train, he says that post was a mistake.
Wine-train employees marched the book club members through six railroad cars before escorting them off the train, the women said. “We feel like we were never their customers, and they never ever made accommodations for us. When those celebrations impact our guests, we do intervene”.
“Following verbal and physical abuse toward other guests and staff, it was necessary to get our police involved”, said the statement, which Johnson shared on Facebook.
The post has since been removed, and the company is now apologizing for the women’s “terrible experience” and the “inaccurate post”.
Wine train employees had called police in St. Helena about the book club members, who were already off the train when officers arrived. It was there that the book club members received a refund. The 11 women ranging in age from 36 to 85 had planned to use the rail journey to discuss “A Man’s Promise” by Brenda Jackson, the group’s novel of the month, according to Jackson.
“We have been insensitive once we requested you to depart our practice by marching you down the aisle previous all the opposite passengers”, he stated in his letter.
Staff claimed the group was dumped mid-journey after fellow riders complained the women were being too loud, which prompted one of them to chronicle the incident on social media and give rise to the hashtag #LaughingWhileBlack.
One member of the group is 83.
As of Tuesday afternoon, an online petition demanding an apology from the wine train executive had garnered more than 14,200 signatures from people all over the world. Coverage of the Wine Train controversy has extended nationwide to the New York Times, USA Today and other media, as well as the Daily Mail and the Telegraph in the United Kingdom. Napa Valley Wine Train Napa Valley Wine Train chugs along the California wine trail tour. “I felt like it was a racist attack on us”.
He has offered to have up to 50 members of the book club and their friends come back on the train in a reserved auto as his personal guests. After exiting the train, police transported the ladies in a van to Napa. “But the CEO could not have been smarter in how he responded afterward – apologizing and offering the group a whole coach to all the people who may have been treated inappropriately”. The women say they were ordered off the wine train Saturday, August 22, 2015. “But what’s important is not what happens to you; it’s what you do about it. And they’ve done the right thing; they’ve apologized”. Johnson holds a photograph of the group that was taken before boarding the train.
Johnson attributed the treatment to racial bias, suggesting in a Facebook post that their only offense was “laughing while black”. Enlarge facebook Lisa Renee Johnson posted photos to Facebook.
On Tuesday, Handelman expressed hopes that lessons from the Wine Train dispute would help the tourist business learn to smooth over differences with customers and avoid confrontation.
Taking to Facebook, Johnson put the incident on blast with making it known that the group’s enjoyment did not strike a negative chord with other people on the train.
Giacco invited the book club members, their family and friends to be his guest and ride and fill an entire train vehicle for free.
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Johnson, an author from Antioch, has organized the group’s annual Napa day trips for the past 17 years, she told the Oakland Tribune.
