Restaurant Punk

From employees showing up late for their shifts and being lazy on the job to always needing to answer your phone and noticing that your team isn’t working together, an abundance of annoyances come along with being your own boss. Noelle, George, and Peter are discussing their biggest pet peeves as business owners and answering questions, including:

•  How can you best handle the stress of being a business owner?
• What are the most annoying aspects of owning a restaurant?
• Should you ever silence your phone if you own a business?
• Why is it so frustrating when your employees aren’t working as a team?

There are bound to be he-said-she-said situations in the service and hospitality industry. So, when a customer writes a bad review and their story doesn’t match what your employees report happened, who do you believe? Yianni, Nikos, and Nick are answering questions, including:

• Is the guest always correct?
• Does reading reviews cause restaurant owners to get distracted from their work?
• Are you more likely to believe a guest or your employee when their stories don’t align?
• How should you respond to a negative review?

According to Yianni’s very non-scientific polling practices, about 85% of restaurants in the United States stock ketchup in some form, which begs the question: is ketchup a mandatory cost of doing business? Yianni, Liz, and Noelle are answering questions, including:

•  What is your most horrific restaurant accident story?
• How important is it to stock ketchup in your restaurant?
• What’s the number one condiment in the United States?
• How do you marry ketchup bottles in restaurants, and should you?
• As a customer, how do you feel when you find crusty ketchup?

A member of Kara Restaurant Group recently developed a training manual for bussers/server assistants. Among the many do’s and don’t, one rule stood out to Yianni: Should bussers have any interactions with guests, or should they simply serve in a supporting role to the star of the show – the server? Matt and Liz join him to answer questions, including: 

• Should bussers interact with restaurant guests, and if so, to what extent?
• Is it a server’s job to connect with their tables and command control of the experience?
• Do guests get upset if a busser tells them ‘I’ll relay your request to your server?”
• Are there differences in service standards for breakfast vs. dinner?
• What does it mean to be a busser vs. a server’s assistant?

No two employees are alike, especially when it comes to training new hires. So, when you start to discover that a recent addition to your team is difficult to manage, what should you do? Nikos, Liz, and Peter are discussing hiring and firing and answering questions, including:

• How long should you give a new hire to get the hang of things?
• Are there any sure signs that it’s time to let an employee go?
• Can understanding the bigger picture help people grasp why small details matter?
• What are the downsides of someone working in the same job for multiple decades? 

It’s a question as old as time – or at least as old as the first restaurant: how did you create your menu? When you’re working in the hospitality industry or any creative profession, it can become challenging to remain inspired. So, how do you avoid creative fatigue and keep your cuisine fresh? Nikos, Nick, and Emaleigh are answering questions, including:

• As a chef, where do you find the inspiration for your dishes?
• Do you have to personally enjoy a dish for it to make the cut on your menu?
• How does knowing basic flavor profiles improve your ability to conduct improvisational cooking?
• How do you cook your bacon?
• What are the best ways to stay inspired to create new dishes at your restaurant?

Sun and moon signs, mercury in retrograde, crystals, and rituals…it’s getting witchy on the Restaurant Punk set this week as Nick, Noelle, and Liz discuss what they do to feel prepared for – and cleansed from – their workdays. Questions include:

• Do you carry crystals in the workplace, and if so, which ones?
• What is the purpose of carrying crystals, and is it real or a placebo effect?
• Are there any mantras that you repeat before every shift?
• Can you really manifest positive and negative events in your life?
• How has spirituality in the workplace evolved over the last 100 years?

The average American has 3.84 credit cards and dines out 4.2 times weekly. So, how do those two facts impact business owners? Across the country, businesses have varying practices to limit the negative effects of credit card surcharges on their bottom line. Nikos, Liz, and Peter are discussing cash discounts and credit card surcharges and answering questions, including:

•  Are people more inclined to spend more when they're paying with a card vs. cash?
• How much does the average business owner payout in credit card fees?
• Is it better to incorporate your credit card fees into menu prices or add them to the final total?
• What are the benefits of using a credit card as a consumer?

 Dining out can be expensive, especially when the restaurant starts adding on charges left and right. From corkage fees to plate sharing upcharges and everything in between, Nick, Noelle, and Peter are diving into why businesses choose to add these charges onto the final tab. Questions in this week’s episode include:

• What are your thoughts on restaurants implementing corking or plate-sharing fees?
• Do you pour the wine for your customers at a BYOB?
• Are servers liable for customers who over-drink at a BYOB restaurant?
• Are plate-sharing fees designed to discourage customers from splitting meals?
• What are the benefits of adding surcharges at restaurants?

When you operate a restaurant or bar business in a highly seasonal community, how should you approach hiring? Do you only onboard team members who can stick it out 12 months a year, or should you consider hiring employees with better personalities but only limited seasonal availability? Liz, Noelle, and Nikos are answering questions about what it takes to hire an ‘A-Team,’ including:

• Do you reserve the busiest shifts for the most personable team members or those who are most dedicated?
• Can you teach someone with talent but no personality how to make it in the hospitality business?
• Do parents get away with slacking off more in the workplace?
• How can you prevent year-round team members from growing resentful of their seasonal counterparts?
• Is it OK to let your ‘star’ employees claim the best shifts while not contributing to side work?