Noblesville McDonald's responds to allegation worm was found in Diet Coke
Nicole Eliason was just going about her normal day on August 25. She dropped the kids off at school, then swung through the drive-through of the McDonald's at 17650 Village Center Drive in Noblesville. She got her usual breakfast sandwich and a large Diet Coke and headed off to do her grocery shopping.
As she put her groceries into her car, she reached for the remnants of her Diet Coke -- by now she'd drunk nearly three-quarters of the beverage --and took a big swig.
"My brain was just not registering the foreign object that was in my mouth," Eliason said. She spit it out onto asphalt of the parking lot and could not believe her eyes.
It was an earthworm.
"I just kind of stood there for a minute and I think I said out loud, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’ It didn’t seem real."
Eliason says that she never opened the cup's lid prior to slurping up the worm. She says the cup went directly from the drive-through window to her car's cup holder, and was never set on the ground or any other worm-friendly spot.
"I was just enjoying that Diet Coke, as I have for many years, probably way too many (years), in fact. It's hard to digest, the fact that it was just marinating in there as I’m sipping on it and I had practically finished the entire drink."
Eliason snapped a picture of the worm on the ground, then scooped it back into the cup and headed back to McDonald's to find out what happened.
Nicole Eliason - So I swing through McDonald's to grab a... | Facebook
Back at the restaurant, Eliason says she was shuffled through a procession of managers. The store manager looked at the worm and asked what Eliason wanted her to do. Did she want her money back?
"I said 'no, I’m not looking for my money back, but I’m shook up, I’m sick to my stomach. I’m absolutely disappointed and surprised, this is unacceptable and I need to talk to somebody about it,'" Eliason says.
Then the store owner, known to Eliason as "Rich," came out. Eliason asked how a worm could have ended up in her fountain soda.
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Rich didn't offer an explanation, Eliason said. He dumped the worm onto a napkin and said he would send it to McDonald's corporate for testing to see what it was. "It was clear exactly what it was – it’s a worm," Eliason said.
Rich chuckled. Then he offered Eliason free McDonald's Diet Coke for life. However, Eliason isn't planning on drinking McDonald's Diet Coke again, ever, so she declined the offer.
“When you settle down," Eliason said Rich told her, "You give me a call and let me know what we can do.”
Still shaken, she left and said she contacted the Hamilton County Health Department. Her Facebook post detailing the incident has been shared more than 3,000 times.
"I wanted to let people know they should probably stay away from that restaurant. I’m happy to share my story, and if it in some way, shape or form helps someone else, or helps someone stay away, that’s good," she said.
Eliason still isn't sure how she wants McDonald's to make things right. "I'm still collecting my thoughts ... I’ve had very little appetite since then. I just want to make sure that I’m not making any sort of emotional decisions but, that I'm calm, cool and collected through the process."
"Somebody needs to be held responsible for this," she said.
A McDonald's manager who declined to give her name told IndyStar that the restaurant checked its soft drink lines after the woman complained and found no obvious way a worm might have infiltrated the closed system. In a statement provided by McDonald's corporate, the unidentified owner/operator of the store wrote, "We have taken the appropriate steps to investigate this matter and have been unable to substantiate this claim. Furthermore, the health department has conducted a food safety audit in the restaurant and did not identify any issue similar to the one claimed.”
Calls to the health department have not been returned.
Vic Ryckaert contributed to this story. Allison Carter is an engagement producer at IndyStar. Follow her on Twitter @AllisonLCarter.