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'A Christmas blessing': Missouri bartender shocked with $1,000 tip
By Janine Puhak
Published December 11, 2020
St. Nick would certainly approve of this generous gift.
A bartender in Missouri said she’ll get to make Christmas magical for her five kids after receiving a $1,000 tip from a first-time customer, perhaps inspired by the spirit of the season.
On Sunday, a barkeep named Valerie worked her shift at Jose Pepper’s in Liberty and served two customers who stayed awhile at the Mexican restaurant, Fox 4 KC reports.
“When his friend went to pay the bill, he said ‘I want to give you a tip’ and handed me his credit card,'" Valerie remembered. (iStock)
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“He and his friend came to the bar and spent a couple of hours eating, drinking and watching football,” she recalled. “When his friend went to pay the bill, he said ‘I want to give you a tip’ and handed me his credit card.’”
However, she couldn’t just run a cashless transaction, and charged him $0.79 cents for a drink to make it work. When the customer handed back the bill, Valerie was stunned to see that he had tipped a thousand bucks.
“I was just shocked,” the bartender said. “I was dumbfounded. I looked at him and asked if he was serious. Or was this a joke?”
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“He said, ‘If this will make your Christmas and the rest of the year better, then that makes me happy and it’s well worth it,’” she added.
“I was just shocked,” the bartender said. “I was dumbfounded. I looked at him and asked if he was serious. Or was this a joke?” (iStock)
The good deed snowballed; in another "Christmas blessing," Valerie said the other customer left a $150 cash tip, too.
“It’s a huge blessing for us. We have five kids and now we can pay our bills and our kids can have Christmas,” she told Fox 4 of the sweet surprise. “I was able to do all my Christmas shopping for my kids.”
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Jon Branstetter, president of the Greater Kansas City Restaurant Association, said he’d never heard of a local server receiving such a tremendous tip, and called it “a wonderful story.”
Forever thankful to her Christmas “angel,” Valerie said that she hopes to pay it forward to someone else in need, a mission especially important as the coronavirus pandemic continues to upend daily life.
“The man who gave me this is an angel. He will make this a memorable Christmas and story for us to tell the rest of our lives,’’ she mused. “I will always remember the Christmas I received that $1,000 tip.”
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https://www.foxnews.com/food-drink/christmas-blessing-missouri-bartender-shocked