Burger King Fires Mother, Son After Viral Photo

Burger King has fired a mother and son team, along with all of the son’s friends, after a photo of the mother’s hiring practices at the fast-food restaurant went viral.

WLBT-3 is reporting that Shakayla Dixon, Corderrion Valentine, and three others were fired after Dixon, who was the manager at a Clinton, Mississippi, restaurant, posted a photo of Valentine and three of his friends working at the restaurant on Facebook.

Dixon claimed that she wanted to help the boys earn extra money before school started again in the fall. “After the post, probably like later that evening, the post started doing numbers. It got to like 1K at that point,” she said to the outlet.

The photo was then reposted by Nick Cannon, who shared it with his millions of Instagram followers.

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Burger King then dispatched a district manager to the area, as they had some “concerns” over Dixon’s hiring practices.

“I got a call from my area manager and my district leader,” Dixon said. “She said we don’t want to turn something good into something bad, but we have some concerns. The concerns she had were the fact that Corderrion is my son and how much money they were getting paid.”

She continued: “She told me that a minor is supposed to get paid differently than what an adult gets paid. It was never brought to my attention beforehand. My things were when it came down to policy. I feel like policy wasn’t in play in the beginning.”

Dixon and the four teenagers were officially fired from their positions late last week. They have also set up a GoFundMe account to help with their expenses.

Burger King could not be reached for comment.

Earlier this year, it was announced that Carrols Restaurant Group, the largest Burger King franchisee in the United States, will be purchased by Restaurant Brands International for a cash price of $1 billion.

The acquisition was announced a year after Restaurant Brands revealed its intention to invest $400 million to reposition Burger King in the United States. At the time, it was anticipated that this transaction would close before the end of this year’s second quarter.

It has been difficult for Burger King to compete with Wendy’s, which has overtaken it as “the second-largest burger chain by U.S. sales,” according to CNBC. This comeback plan entails spending money to revitalize the eatery and boosting advertising to raise customer demand and franchisee earnings.