Customer leaves $16K tip at New Hampshire restaurant

LONDONDERRY, N.H. — As far as the workers at a New Hampshire restaurant are concerned, this customer can stumble in any time.

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An anonymous diner left a $16,000 tip after spending nearly $38 for lunch on June 12, WCSH reported.

“I thought it was a mistake,” Mike Zarella, owner of the Stumble Inn Bar & Grill in Londonderry, told the television station. “Typo.”

It was no mistake, and certainly not a joke. The restaurant staff shares all of the tips, so eight servers got to split the generous tip. They are also including the cooks, WCSH reported.

The customer ordered two chili dogs, fried pickle chips and a few cocktails, rolling up a $37.93 tab, Fox News reported.

The customer, who sat by himself at the restaurant’s outdoor bar, is “kind of a mystery man,” bartender Michelle McCudden told WCSH.

Zarella said the five-figure tip took some time to clear the bank, and he added that at first, he cautioned his staff not to get too excited about it in case there was an issue, Fox News reported.

But the cash cleared Friday, and now there are some very happy employees at the Stumble Inn.

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“It’s unbelievable. I just never in my life thought somebody would come in here and do that,” Zarella told Fox News in a telephone interview. “I didn’t even think it was going to be true until it cleared the bank, which was last Friday. I was like, ‘No way.’ I told my staff don’t get too excited because this doesn’t happen.”

McCudden said the past year has been tough on the staff, but the customer’s generosity was uplifting.

“We went up and we thanked him,” McCudden told WCSH. “It’s just been a really rough year for all of us. For someone to do something like that really restored my faith in humanity. He just said that we work really hard and he wanted to do something nice and he just really wanted us to have it.”

“Everybody thought it might be a celebrity that was here, but it wasn’t. It was just an average Joe,” Zarella told Fox News. “He gave the money and doesn’t want any PR out of it. … He doesn’t want anything. I even tried to comp his meal last Saturday night and he said, ‘No.’”


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