Popeyes 'Undercover Boss' Gives Hurricane Katrina Victim $10,000

By Michael Hein

A clip from Undercover Boss is going viral all over again right now, taking fans back to the time after Hurricane Katrina. In a 2012 episode, Popeye's Chicken executive Lynne Zappone went undercover as a new employee at a restaurant location in New Orleans, Louisiana. After meeting an employee named Gina who survived the infamous hurricane, Zappone gave her a gift that clearly changed her life.

The clip was shared by the streaming service Dabl, which now hosts Undercover Boss. Ten years after it aired, it's still a powerful reality TV moment to reflect on. It starts with Zappone learning the harsh realities of working in her restaurant, including infrastructural issues like bad plumbing and a shortage of vital tools like cleaning supplies. In that time, she is trained by a shift manager named Gina who has been with her company for two decades, and who survived Hurricane Katrina within the city itself. The clip then cuts to Zappone's big reveal, where she explains how she will act on what she's seen.

Zappone starts by assuring Gina that she will get the broken pipe in the wall fixed and that her restaurant will be stocked with all the proper cleaning supplies from now on. This alone seems to give the manager some relief, as does the praise and recognition from Zappone. After that, things get a bit more personal between the two women.

Having heard about how Hurricane Katrina scattered Gina's family across the map, Zappone offers to host a family reunion for her at the company's expense. It includes lodging, travel and activities for Gina's family members. This excites Gina, but she gets truly emotional when Zappone explains that she will be starting an employee relief fund to aid workers who experience difficult times like Gina's trials in the hurricane. Finally, last of all Zappone reveals that Gina will be the first recipient of this new fund, granting her $10,000 to recover from the devastation.

This conversation brings Gina to tears, and it's not hard to imagine why. Earlier in the episode, she described her hurricane experience to Zappone, including the fact that she had no access to drinking water for two days. Gina stocked up on canned goods ahead of time, and she said she survived by drinking the water from canned vegetables like corn.

Natural disasters are statistically on the rise in the U.S., so emergency response efforts like this will only become more important in the years to come. Undercover Boss is still on the air, and hopefully it can continue to bridge the gap between workers' needs and employers' priorities.

Undercover Boss is streaming now on Paramount+. It is also available on Dabl, which is available on its own or as an add-on for a variety of other services.

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