(WGN/NEXSTAR) – Buffalo Wild Wings has nothing but saucy remarks after getting slapped with a class-action lawsuit over its boneless wings.
Last week, Chicago man Aimen Halim filed the complaint with the U.S. District Court of Northern Illinois, alleging that Buffalo Wild Wings had been engaging in “false and deceptive marketing and advertising” by calling its boneless wings “wings,” arguing that the dish is not made with de-boned wings, but rather chicken breast meat.
A representative for Buffalo Wild Wings had not responded to a request for comment as of Tuesday morning. But on Monday, the team behind the restaurant’s social media accounts appeared to issue a snarky comment on Twitter.
“It’s true. Our boneless wings are all white meat chicken,” reads the tweet, which soon turns cheeky. “Our hamburgers contain no ham. Our buffalo wings are 0% buffalo.”
The tweet, which has been viewed more than 50,000 times as of Tuesday morning, garnered plenty of support among Buffalo Wild Wing’s fans.
“Great response to an asinine lawsuit,” one remarked.
“Oh, the delicious snark!” another wrote. “Let it waft over you.”
Plenty of commenters on the other side of the argument took Buffalo Wild Wings to task over the tweet. Several accused the chain of deflecting, and some pointed out that the meaning of “buffalo” and “hamburger” (when it comes to foodstuffs) has been well-established and neither refers to actual buffaloes or ham, but rather the cities of Buffalo and Hamburg, respectively.
“Nice try but ‘Buffalo’ stands for the city not the animal. Your wings should be real. Stop being deceptive,” one commenter wrote.
“Wings are supposed to be WINGS. You can’t deflect by saying it doesn’t have buffalo,” another argued.
Halim, meanwhile, is seeking damages — both injunctive relief and punitive — in the class-action filing.
Halim’s lawsuit stems from a January 2023 incident, during which the plaintiff bought boneless wings from a Buffalo Wild Wings in Mount Prospect, Illinois, and thought just that: the boneless wings he purchased were exclusively made from chicken wing meat.
When Halim found out Buffalo Wild Wings’ boneless wings weren’t deboned chicken wings, he said he would not have purchased them or would have paid significantly less for the product.
As a result, Halim said he suffered a financial injury due to the restaurant’s “false and deceptive conduct.”
Halim goes on to compare Buffalo Wild Wings to other fast food restaurant chains like Papa Johns and Domino’s in the complaint, noting that both companies sell products like Buffalo Wild Wings’ boneless wings, but not by that name. At Papa Johns, the product is called “Chicken Poppers,” while at Domino’s, they are called “boneless chicken.”
But Buffalo Wild Wings is far from the only chain to call their boneless wings “wings”; chains including Wingstop, Chili’s and Dave & Busters, among others, use the same terminology for similar dishes.
As some Twitter users have also observed, the term “boneless wings” might be akin to advertising hot dogs as “hot dogs” and not, say, “frankfurter-style sausages.”
“Your boneless wings are just nuggets and I’m all for it,” one Twitter user wrote, seemingly commenting on both sides of the argument.
