California woman says she brought groceries for $100, then started eating a rotisserie chicken in her car. Then came a ‘harsh knock’ on her window

A California woman has claimed a security guard forced her to leave a grocery store parking lot after interrupting her lunch. The incident reportedly happened shortly after she finished a gym session and bought more than $100 in groceries. She decided to eat some of her rotisserie chicken in her car before driving home because the meal smelled good, according to The Nerd Stash.

She said she parked far from the entrance to avoid taking spots from other shoppers. However, a security guard reportedly approached her car after she had spent only two minutes eating. “Two minutes into my late lunch, I get a harsh knock on my window from store security telling me to move along,” she wrote.

The woman, who posts under the username Hydratedstoner, shared the experience on Reddit. Many commenters agreed with her frustration and criticized the security guard for focusing on a paying customer instead of actual store issues. The post appears to echo an incident in which a Walmart shopper eating tacos was told by a security guard to leave the lot.

Reddit users could not believe a security guard did this over chicken

One commenter argued that guards often let people walk out with merchandise as they cannot stop theft in the moment, yet will still tell a paying customer to leave. The complaint comes as some stores, including Walmart, have reportedly adopted extreme measures against theft in their meat sections.

Others found the security guard’s behavior baffling. “Can’t a person just sit in their car and eat chicken? Apparently not,” one person wrote, while another asked what kind of power trip someone would need to be on to do this. A fourth commenter joked about the encounter, asking, “What was the crime, eating a succulent chicken meal?”

The experience was apparently unpleasant enough that the shopper is now looking for a different place to buy her food. “It sounds ridiculous but I genuinely think I’m changing grocery stores,” she wrote. As she had spent more than $100 on groceries that day, the store could lose a regular customer over a single encounter with its security guard.

During the discussion, some commenters reportedly brought up the woman’s skin color. They questioned whether she was Black based on her food choices, which appeared to stir tension in the thread. She clarified that she is a “multi-racial woman.” However, she pushed back, asking, “Why do we need to drag race into it?”