Woman In Tears After Customers Reject Her Kind Offer At Grocery Store — 'My Intentions Were Purely To Brighten Someone's Day'
She was testing out a random act of kindness but the customers didn't want her help.
@millyg_fit / TikTok A woman’s random act of kindness backfired after her actions were rejected by everyone she offered to help. She was taken aback by people’s reactions, claiming that she only wanted to “brighten someone’s day.”
Although, some people believed that her good deed was not one done out of genuine kindness, but for her own personal gain.
The woman offered to pay for shoppers’ groceries at the checkout counter and none of them accepted her offer.
Milly G, a fitness influencer on TikTok decided to document her act of kindness for her viewers in a video that has been viewed over 800,000 times.
Her video starts off with her in tears after her plan did not go accordingly. “This was the result of me wanting to do something very nice and buy someone’s food shop,” Milly says, admitting that she felt “defeated.”
She took a trip to the grocery store, Sainsbury’s, to surprise shoppers by offering to pay for their items. “I just really want to cheer someone up,” she shares. “I just hope they don’t look at me thinking I’m some weirdo.”
Upon entering the store, Milly admits that she’s scared of how shoppers will react to her offer. She spots a man with a full shopping cart and decides that he will be the first person she chooses to make their day brighter.
“Excuse me, this may be really random, but I’d love to pay for your food shop today,” she says to the customer, who is off camera.
“Why?” the perplexed man can be heard saying. “Just because I want to,” Milly tells him. “I do this thing where I wanna do something nice every day.” However, the man rejects her offer. “I really don’t need it,” he says. After Milly continues to insist to pay, she says that he started to grow “angry.”
Instead, she moves on to another customer behind the man to extend the offer. The woman responds with, “No.” At this point, Milly wonders if she should just leave the store. “I felt so embarrassed and judged,” she wrote in the text overlay of her video, noting that other customers were staring at her.
Still, believing that the third time’s a charm, she asks one more customer if she could pay for their groceries. The customer shuts her down, claiming that she doesn’t need the help. “There are a lot more deserving people in the world, but thank you,” she says. “I feel too guilty taking it.”
Since no customers accepted her offer, Milly opts to show generosity in a different way.
She decides to purchase pasta and sauces from the store and drop it off at the food bank on the way out. Although she wound up doing a good deed, she admits that the entire ordeal of getting rejected by customers was “stressful.”
“I was expecting the first person to be overjoyed and grateful and happy for me to pay for their shopping,” Milly says.
Overwhelmed with emotion, she reveals that she is happy that at least the food she donated will go to someone who needs it and opens up about how the experience of asking customers if she could pay for their food was challenging for her since many social situations make her anxious.
“That was really hard for me but we did it,” Milly says as she wipes away tears.
Despite her good intentions, some TikTok users accused Milly of offering to pay for strangers’ groceries for her own personal self-importance.
“I feel that sharing your good deeds online is more about serving your ego than others,” one user commented.
Others pointed out that the customers likely felt uncomfortable that they were being filmed or that Milly assumed that they needed help. “I think she’s kind but personally I would say no if someone was filming the interaction like I’m being used for TikTok clout,” one user wrote.
"I personally wouldn’t like it either, the filming puts me off but also I’d think 'oh do I look like I’m poor'" another user shared.
However, others commended Milly for her kind actions.
“You should be so proud of your pure intentions, no one can take away your intentions,” one person commented.
“I'm so sorry people didn't accept your act of kindness! The people who get the food you did end up buying will be so grateful,” another user wrote. Others suggested that Milly go to a budget store next time or a store where customers would be more grateful for her actions and shoppers would benefit from it.
Megan Quinn is a writer at YourTango who covers entertainment and news, self, love, and relationships.