Oceana slammed for offering free entry in return for a banana

A local charity has slammed Oceana’s ‘Cheeky Tuesdays’ for wasting “fifty to sixty” bananas a week.

A report on BBC South East Today this week has laid into Oceana Southampton for a promotion intended to tempt students in with a ‘cheeky’ cut-price entry deal.

Oceana, an iconic nightlife staple for first years and unemployed locals, has for the last few months been rolling out a ‘Cheeky Tuesdays’ promotion.

Students who show up to doors holding a banana are given free entry, instead of the usual price of £5.

“One of these.”

However, despite a capacity of as many as 4000, Oceana claim that just “fifty to sixty” take advantage of the promotion each week- even though the BBC reporter claims that “almost everyone [they] met” was “clutching” a banana.

They’ve promoted the discount heavily on social media, including this picture of a fairly dishevelled but extremely cheeky banana, supposedly hidden at a student halls for use as an erstwhile sex toy and nightclub entry ticket.

The piece shows a selection of drunk-but-not-smashed students shambling through explanations of the promotion, with one commenting that staff “put them behind a thing”, after which customers are no longer privy to the internal handling of the bananas. One student reveals he finds it “easier than handing over a credit card”.

Another added that he “can’t think of any logical reason [for] what they would do with them”- which is where the BBC find some drama.

Louisa Hamidi, who works for Curb, a local food group redistributing waste food, called the promotion a “waste of time, resources, transport” and “nutritional content”.

“You like bananas as it is.”

Oceana denied that their promotion was wasteful, telling the BBC “the bananas we recieve … are offered to our 120 employees to eat during their shift”.

They added that “if there is a local charity, such as Curb, who could benefit from the unused bananas, then we would be more than happy to donate them.”