The Five Guys on Merrill Road Just Got a $1,200 Bonus Check. Here’s Why.

If you've ever grabbed a burger at Five Guys on Merrill Road, you might appreciate this one.

Back in February, Five Guys tried to celebrate its 40th birthday by offering a buy one, get one free burger deal. It did not go as planned. Sales jumped 130 percent, stores ran out of food, the app crashed, and workers were completely overwhelmed. Most CEOs would have issued a statement and moved on.

Not Jerry Murrell.

The 82-year-old founder wrote 1,500 checks, one for each store, for $1,000 apiece. That's $1.5 million out of his own pocket, distributed directly to the frontline crews who dealt with the chaos.

His explanation for why he did it? Pure gold.

"I didn't want anybody shooting me in the back or anything after the first day, because we really screwed it up," Murrell told Fortune magazine. "We had no idea that we were going to get that kind of response." -fortune.com

He also came clean about what the money was originally earmarked for.

"I was gonna buy my wife a new fur coat, and I spent it on the bonus instead," he said. "She still looks at me like I'm stupid. But I thought it was worth it. They worked so hard.

They were so overwhelmed."

Not exactly your typical corporate damage control. Five Guys remains one of the only major fast food chains that is still fully private and family run.

The Pittsfield location on Merrill Road was among the 1,500 stores that received a check.

On Monday afternoon, I popped over there and spoke to Ken and Stefan who told me that corporate sent the store a $1,200 check to be split between the employees who worked the most hours.

"I got a nice little bit of change", said Stefan, who worked 3 out of the 4 BOGO days.