FOIE GRAS PROTESTS AT THE MASTER BUILDERS HOUSE HOTEL Articles / Foie Gras Posted by SARC on Dec 26, 2009 - 11:17 PM 18.12.09 SARC protesters continued the Foie Gras campaign by visiting The Master Builders House Hotel in Beaulieu, The New Forest. We decided to go into the reception first to see if we could have a reasonable conversation about the issue before we started our protest. Their current menu doesn't show it. However, when asked if they sell Foie Gras, they said that they currently don't but they do offer it as a seasonal dish and that it would be on the menu again. We politely asked to speak to the manager who began to discuss the issue reasonably with us. The head chef was also present. He said that if he wanted he could get Foie Gras within a day of making the phonecall. We asked if they would consider making the ethical choice and promise to remove it from their menus forever. But apparently the customer comes first and if they request it, they will order it. The owner of the hotel was called whilst we were there, he wouldn't make the decision to stop selling it in future and actually welcomed us to voice our opinions and have a protest. So, we tried the reasonable approach, and it didn't work. We decided to stand outside with our placards and make our statement about the cruelty behind Foie Gras while handing out leaflets to the guests of the hotel. We were merely stating the facts. The manager however didn't seem to want us on the site and came out to stop us. He didn't want us to use the megaphone and actually threatened us. We moved to the car-park to try and diffuse the situation, there we spoke to a much more reasonable member of staff who took quite an interest in why we were there. He explained that Foie Gras was getting less and less popular anyway now because of the price, people are being more careful with their money and are less likely to splash out on supposed delicacies. This is a good thing, but we would rather people were giving up Foie Gras for ethical reasons. Either way our Foie Gras campaign has been going extremely well, with most of Hampshire foie grass free SARC have a lot to be proud of. This article is from SARC   http://sarconline.co.uk/ The URL for this story is:   http://sarconline.co.uk/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=558