SAN JOSE, Calif. (KRON) – A San Jose small business owner says Tesla unexpectedly canceled orders for thousands of mini pies, leaving his pie shop thousands of dollars in the red.
Voahangy Rasetarinera owns Giving Pies in San Jose's Willow Glen neighborhood. Each pie is carefully assembled by hand in small batches. Despite this, the bakery has managed to cobble together orders from big companies like Apple, Google, and Intuit.
On Valentine's Day, the bakery received a last-minute order request from Tesla. 2,000 pies, half to be delivered on Tuesday and the other half on Thursday. Lacetarinella said she agrees. But then the waiting game for Tesla's payment began.
Racetarinella said that after not hearing back from her contacts, she contacted them again and sent multiple invoices to different people. Finally, at 9pm on Thursday night, she received a call from Tesla. The company apologized for the late payment and asked that the order be doubled to 4,000 pies.
“So I contacted the staff and they were like, 'Yes, you can work Saturday, Sunday and Monday.' We can make it. No problem,” Racetarinella recalled.
She said she sent Tesla an amended invoice but still hasn't received payment. She reached out multiple times and eventually got a response via text message.
“Sorry for the inconvenience again, but I'm a small business. I can't afford unlimited resources and I really need a paycheck to keep my staff. “Sorry, this order is no longer needed. “I don't think so,” Racetarinella said.
Lacetarinella turned down other orders and had already purchased materials, boxes, stickers and other resources. She posted about it on social media, and she says Tesla saw it and got in touch.
“They said they wanted to do it with me and offered me to do two events on March 6 and 7, but I'm still waiting for confirmation,” she said. “If they want to make it right, I'm going to give them the opportunity to make it right.”
KRON4 reached out to Tesla for comment but had not received a response as of Thursday night.
