Two workers at an Ohio Little Caesars location were fired after making a pizza with the pepperoni arranged in a swastika.
Customers Jason and Misty Laska said store management told them it was an inside joke that accidentally got out.
The couple told News 5 Cleveland they had picked up the pizza from the grab-and-go section of the location in Brook Park, a suburb of Cleveland.
“I said, ‘What do you guys have left?’ And they said a pepperoni and a cheese and I said ‘Give me the pepperoni,’” Jason Laska told the station.
It wasn’t until the couple returned home that they saw what was in the box. Misty Laska shared an image of the Nazi design on Twitter:
Jason Laska spoke with the location’s owner after the incident.
“According to the owner, it was intended to be a joke internally between just the employees,” he told the Cleveland Jewish News.
“The point is, there should not be this kind of hate happening today. With the climate we’re in right now, why make a joke like that?” Misty Laska told Cleveland’s 19 News.
Little Caesars told local Fox station WJW that it had “zero tolerance for racism and discrimination in any form” and noted that the workers had been fired. But that wasn’t enough for the Laskas: Jason said they’re not going back and Misty added that they support diversity.
“We embrace and love it,” she said. “We just want to see this hate stop.”