Not lovin’ it: Wellington McDonald’s customer finds ‘salt-crusted hair mass’ in chips

A Wellington woman says she’s “disgusted” after claiming to have found a deep-fried clump of hair in her McDonald’s chips.

The woman, who Newshub has agreed not to name, said she went through Newtown McDonald’s’ drive-thru on Wednesday morning and ordered her go-to meal, a Big Mac combo. 

The woman told Newshub she took her meal home to eat, and after eating the burger she began digging into the chips. 

“I think I would have been a third of the way through. And then I pulled out a chip and there was this salt-crusted hair mass that was attached to my chip,” she said.

“I was just sort of like, ‘Oh my goodness’, obviously grossed out because it’s pretty disgusting.” 

The woman shared her hair-raising discovery on the community Facebook group Vic Deals, where she said many others reacted to her unpleasant find.  

“Everyone was pretty disgusted by it. I mean, it was such a gross thing.”

She said the clump of hair had strands of brown and black hair in it and what she believed could be red fabric thread from the McDonald’s staff uniform.

“And I’m blonde so it wasn’t any of my hair.”

The woman alerted McDonald’s to her hairy situation and they offered a free meal or vouchers for the franchise.  

In a statement to Newshub, a McDonald’s spokesperson said the restaurant manager contacted the woman “as soon as they were made aware of the photo” on Wednesday morning.

“[They] apologised for their customer experience and offered compensation in the form of vouchers which was accepted.”

The spokesperson said the validity of the woman’s claim “wasn’t looked into further as it was considered resolved directly and the customer seemed happy with being compensated”.

Newshub has seen the woman’s bank statement for McDonald’s and the text messages between the woman and the manager.

When asked if the woman would return to the local McDonald’s, she said: “Probably not. No, not after that.”

“I obviously didn’t get sick from it, but I just felt gross afterwards.”