China has erupted over an ice cream incident at an auto show.
Footage was shared on social media showing foreigners chowing down on ice cream as locals were apparently denied the frozen snack.
The incident took place at the BMW stand at the Shanghai International Automobile Industry Exhibition in Shanghai on Wednesday
Video of the incident has gone wildly viral.
The video showed two female staffers at the BMW MINI model booth apparently refusing to provide free ice cream to Chinese visitors. They informed them that the ice cream had already run out.
But then shortly afterwards, a foreigner arrived at the booth and asked for ice cream. The employees found a thermal case with ice cream inside it.
Another visitor questioned the women and a male staffer took the case away, the footage appeared to show.
BMW later issued an apology, blaming internal management issues and said it would improve staff training.
The hashtag “BMW MINI” trended on China’s social media app Sina Weibo as anger grew in the communist nation. When BMW issued its statement, the topic “apology from BMW MINI” gained about 350 million views, the Global Times reports.
“This has taken away my good feelings towards BMW,” one person wrote.
The incident sparked heated discussion online about whether Chinese visitors to the auto show had been discriminated against.
A source told the Daily Mail that the booth had finished giving out 300 free ice creams to visitors and the foreigner in the video was a BMW employee.
The female workers had been temporarily hired for the show and were not part of the BMW team, the source said.
Earlier in the week, BMW CEO Oliver Zipse explained how important the Chinese market was to the German manufacturer.
Originally published as China erupts over ice cream incident at Shanghai auto show
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