Last week I got paid to eat fried chicken. Yeah, the consumer tables were temporarily turned in my favor!
I agreed to tag along and participate with a couple of officemates who were volunteering in this food tasting research activity. The research company conducting the study was so desperate in trying to recruit participants that before heading inside the hall where they were conducting interviews, they actually spoon fed us the appropriate responses for the preliminary screening to make us eligible for the actual food tasting.
Based from the acceptable replies I was instructed to say, I basically had to lie about two things. One, instead of being 30 years old, I was advised to be a year younger due to the age parameter they had. No problem there! I never acted my age anyway. Second, I should say that I eat at least three times a week in local fast food establishments. This is where I really fibbed a little. People who know me know for a fact that I do not eat at fast foods for environmental reasons.
To safeguard the research company’s identity, I’ll skimp on the details and skip right away to the part where we were actually testing the product.
Due to confidentiality agreements with the company they were conducting the research for, the actual name of the product we were going to test was not divulged. But given that there are only a handful of fast food establishments dominating the market, I’m pretty sure it’s one of the big players.
We were gathered in this huge room where we were all given a piece of chicken to eat. I was famished, and quite honestly, it was partly the reason I agreed to participate. When I was given the cue to eat I devoured the chicken thigh part they served faster than a homeless person.
The chicken was hot and spicy, and discounting the fact that I was indeed starving, it was actually very good!
While I was finishing off the left over meat on the chicken bone like a fire ant in a laboratory, the research staff took out a survey questionnaire and started asking me questions.
“So what can you say about the color? How would you rate it on a scale of 1 to 5, five being the highest?”
It was a weird question. Unless fried chicken is served in a color other than golden brown, like dark slate blue or lawn green, you don’t ask that question and expect a person to rate it objectively.
I stared at the clean chicken bone and cartilage left on the plate and said, “Uh oh... I guess you should have asked me that question before I finished it off. I can’t remember, I was so hungry, but it looked alright... umm, 4?”
“Ok. How about the aroma, how would you rate the smell of the chicken?”
Another odd question. I don’t usually meticulously sniff my food, not unless I am not sure what dish I am being served. How can I comment on the smell of the chicken? I ate the damn thing, I didn’t date it! It smelled nothing more like hot cooking oil. Actually it smelled exactly like fried chicken. Man, I must be the worst research respondent ever!
I was trying not to be a goof ball about it, because I do realize that I was going to be paid and that my responses might even end up as a quote or footnote on the Spicy Chicken Consumer Testing Verbatim Report, should there ever be one. In the subsequent round of questions, which were more sensible than the first few, I really objectively rated the product like I was doing one of my blues album reviews. We were given a second sub standard spicy chicken to criticize, so I had a good foothold on where to base my second feedback. It still however, looked and smelled the same.
Although I may question the validity of the findings of this research, given the fact that they allowed nut jobs like me as participants (not to mention the fact that they did ask us to lie about certain things) I am glad to know that we actually have product testing researches to improve or actually access the quality of a product before it hits the market.
I personally think that it’s pretty hard to screw up cooking and serving fried chicken. I mean how friggin’ hard is it to fry a chicken? The worse thing you could probably do is overcook it. I think even cave men at one point eventually figured it out. Seeing how companies are actually spending money to have researches done on something as common fried chicken, I think we are off to a really good start. In the same way, it’s a good thing that call centers have begun to mushroom all over this country. Customer Satisfaction Survey scores are teaching Filipinos exactly how powerful the consumer right is and how it can make or break a business. We usually just bend backwards and take it, but now I think we are really starting to be more vocal and critical of what we purchase and subscribe to.
After the testing was over, we were each paid 400 pesos for participating. It was so cool! I know I earn more than that but I felt like an excited kid getting paid for doing a summer job.
It was a good experience too. The next time someone serves me chicken and asks how I enjoyed it, I’d probably say, “That was a nice colored, pleasant smelling chicken that was definitely good enough to date! Trust me, I once got paid providing vital feedback like that.”
