A former Campbell Soup Company employee secretly recorded one of the company’s executives while he went on a bewildering, expletives-laden, and over-an-hour-long rant.
“We have s*** for f**king poor people,” Campbell vice president and chief information officer Martin Bally allegedly seethed in the recording, as quoted by Detroit-based news station WDIV. “Who buys our s***? I don’t buy Campbell’s products barely anymore. It’s not healthy now that I know what the f***’s in it.”
“Bioengineered meat — I don’t wanna eat a piece of chicken that came from a 3D printer,” he added.
Bally also made derogatory comments about Indian employees, calling them “idiots.”
The worker, Robert Garza, has since sued his former employer for wrongful termination after he was abruptly fired in January, mere days after raising the issue with his manager. Garza was hired remotely as a cybersecurity analyst in September 2024.
The news spread like wildfire on the internet, even catching the attention of Florida attorney general James Uthmeier, who tweeted that the state’s law “bans lab-grown meat” and that its “Consumer Protection division is launching an investigation and will demand answers from Campbell’s.”
The Campbell Soup Company has since attempted to distance itself from the situation, telling CBS News in a statement that the “person alleged to be speaking on the recording works in IT and has nothing to do with how we make our food.”
The company also addressed Bally’s explosive comments that the company allegedly used 3D-printed chicken, saying it uses “100 percent real chicken in our soups.”
“If the comments were in fact made, they are unacceptable,” the statement reads. “The comments heard on the recording about our food are not only inaccurate — they are patently absurd.”
The company also revealed that Bally is currently on leave as it conducts an investigation.
... continue reading