Chowhound is a weekly column about what’s trending in Detroit food culture. Tips: [email protected].
All rise: After strong responses to our last two installments on what’s wrong with industry labor relations, we’ve decided to solicit food service-savvy citizens who might care to make a case for who or what’s behind the current crisis in restaurant work. Whether you blame COVID, customers, a flagging frontline workforce, or a greedy, taskmaster management-ownership culture, if you’d like to take the stand and either decry or defend any aspects of what’s going on these days, step up and send us an opening statement. You just may end up on the docket, representing your fellow servers, chefs, managers, or innkeepers, and appealing to a jury of your peers, some of whom have already reported for duty via email since we convened this hotly-contested conversation. Here’s a sample:
From Bob (former bartender): “I found it interesting that you didn’t ask workers about the problem. After all, they were the subject of the article. If you’d asked them, they’d probably would have told you the way the restaurant industry treated its workers during COVID. Often, longtime workers were laid off and expected to fend for themselves. Why be loyal to an industry that’s not loyal to you?”
Erica (current food business owner), called out some colleagues: “Also as a restaurant owner, the forced gratuity needs to stop. I get it for large parties but I recently went to a restaurant and was so appalled when we got our bill and instead of it reading auto gratuity, it stated ‘live-able wage tax.’
Thank you for stating things people need to hear. Most restaurateurs haven’t ever had to live off the jobs they request others to perform.”
Shawna (a chef currently on career hiatus), took things more personally, taking me to task: “Understanding Robert is a former chef, you would think he’d have empathy and understanding towards the same community he’s been such a big part of. However, based on this article [our June 28 Chowhound], it seems it’s the exact opposite. Which clearly [highlights] the fact that he is obviously part of the problem.”
For the record, readers: I reached out to all three of these responders in follow-up, offering them a forum for further discussion. To date, one declined, and another welcomed the opportunity (we’ve talked). The third and most recent has yet to be heard from with anything more. The offer remains open and official now, as you see. I thank everyone whose responses triggered a decision to pursue this conversation further in an open forum. We encourage consumer comments and questions, informed insider insights, and axes to grind on topics that might spark some debate on vice and virtue in the food trades. Lay on and let us know. Cat got your tongue? Consider these talking points (again, come courtesy of our engaged readers):
- Given that incredibly low hourly wages remain a reality for some (tipped) food service occupations, is this practice tantamount to exploitation? Maybe. Maybe not.
- For those insisting raises to a live-able wage are long-overdue and warranted, who might care to counter, doing the math on what that could mean for costs of menu items across the board going forward? Must exponentially higher labor costs be passed on to the consumer (and at what consequences), or should operators eat them in part or altogether? What are the brass tacks facts of restaurant business economics? What percentage of revenue generally covers cost? What’s contributing most to the many closures?
- Is it fair to pay out vacation time and PTO based on paltry hourly wages?
- Is it fair for workers earning 15-25% tip commissions to expect owners/operators earning a fraction of those percentages to accept an increasingly small sliver of the pie by offering more benefits in an economy of inflated purchasing and operating costs? Might some revenue sharing compromise be considered to salvage the industry’s stressed and strained employer-employee relationship? Could desperate times call for such measures, and who, possibly, can shed some light on innovations their workplaces have implemented to mitigate problems, making things better for everyone concerned?
So, what can you add to the pot we’ve apparently stirred up in this conversation that so many are left stewing over, post-pandemic? Food and beverage Festivus has found its way to Chowhound. Come to the table. It’s time for the airing of grievances. Whatever side you’d like to tell your story from, we’ll lend you an ear here, perchance to have you approach the bench and present your pertinent sidebar. As of right now, we’re looking for litigants. And while we’re neither electing nor selecting ourselves as judge and jury, we’re prepared to sit as mediators in a media-hosted bitch session between the food hospitality industry’s innkeepers, key-holders, culinarians, and frontline service staff who’ve all made the whole thing go. If you think it’s all going to shit for whatever reason(s), now’s your chance to say so. First, a few ground rules:
- Contact us by email at: [email protected] if you wish to be considered for inclusion in our roundtable. In the subject line, include the header “people’s court candidate” to distinguish your email from other topical correspondences we receive. In the body of the email, be succinct about your proposed subject matter. Tell us the essence of your two cents in a paragraph or two rather than lay-out some long-form thesis for us to digest then and there. Again, we’re looking for litigants to add to this docket, not complete arguments contained in your introduction.
- Passion is appreciated. A little vitriol, expected. Still, don’t email us some raging screed if you expect to be heard any further. I’m a big boy. I can take the slings and arrows of outrageous F-Bombs sometimes aimed my way for emphasis. Even so, you may leave us nowhere else to go if you shoot your first shot full of insults.
Like various wisemen have said, reasonable minds can differ. I’m on record for my takes on the current restaurant shitshow. Your turn.
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