Fast food chain KFC has been forced to apologise after sending a message to its customers in Germany urging them to commemorate Kristallnacht with cheesy chicken.
In a push notification from its mobile app, the company wrote: "It's memorial day for Kristallnacht! Treat yourself with more tender cheese on your crispy chicken.”
Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass, often referred to as ‘Novemberpogrome’ in German, was an antisemitic pogrom carried out by the Nazi party’s SA and SS paramilitary forces along with the Hitler Youth and German civilians throughout Nazi Germany on 9-10 November, 1938.
Its name is derived from the many shards of broken glass that littered the streets after the windows of Jewish-owned stores, buildings, and synagogues were smashed.
Ninety one Jews were killed and more than 30,000 were rounded up and sent to concentration camps across Germany and Austria.
It is viewed as the prelude to the Final Solution and the murder of six million Jews during the Holocaust.
The Anti-Defamation League’s associate director of European affairs Dalia Grinfield took to Twitter to vent, writing:: "How wrong can you get on Kristallnacht KFC Germany. Shame on you!"
Daniel Sugarman, director of public affairs at the Board of Deputies of British Jews, slammed the advertisement as “absolutely hideous”.
In a successful attempt to outdo Brewdog in the “Worst Marketing Blunder of the month” stakes, KFC Germany reportedly sent out a push notification offering customers special chicken deals for Kristallnacht, before sending out another message apologising. Absolutely hideous. pic.twitter.com/mRgvA0euEY
— Daniel Sugarman (@Daniel_Sugarman) November 9, 2022
KFC Germany has since apologised for the message, claiming it was the result of an “error in our system”.
A spokesperson said: “Due to an error in our system, we sent an incorrect and inappropriate message through our app. We are very sorry about this, we will check our internal processes immediately so that this does not happen again. Please excuse this error."
