Restaurants are a fun public places for us to go too. It’s where we socialize and surround ourselves with delicious food. I think that we forget about the people who are working to make sure that our night goes right. We forget to realize that they are humans too. Having a job in the restaurant industry is hard. I’ve been a busser, hostess, server assistant and server. It’s not a easy job. I strongly believe based off of my experience that anyone in the restaurant should get paid $15 dollars minimum.
Let’s talk about servers. The role of the server is to ensure that food and drinks were to be made in a timely manner. Sometimes the server has to run their food and retrieve orders while having ten or more tables at a time. That’s stressful. It’s like having all these hungry babies crying for you to feed them. I took pride in my service because I wanted to do a good job to make a good tip. The thing about tipping is that people do not know how to properly tip. The minimum for tipping should be 15 percent of the total bill. Not 10 percent. 15 percent. During my time as a server, I’ve had people leave me nothing for a tip. Here is the problem with that. I had to tip out the busser 10 percent because he washed all the dirty cups and plates and the bartenders at least 15 percent because they made all my drinks. Essentially I am paying for you to have a nice night. That’s not fair. A lot of people who work are trying to make money not lose money. I’m trying to make money to pay off college loans.
The physical demands are ridiculous. When I used to serve. I had to carry these heavy trays that could hold 8 plates of food above my head and I just hoped that it did not fall on me. You are always running around in circles to check on the food in the kitchen, see how your guests are in the dining room, putting the orders in at the four different POS systems. If you are lucky, you’ll be able to run downstairs to pee in the staff bathroom. I’ve probably trained myself not to pee for eight hours.
My role as a hostess was difficult at times. I had to learn how to accept people yelling at me when they walk into a restaurant without a reservation and demanding a table. I definitely grew a backbone. Opentable is another language that you have to learn. It’s how you’ll plot out the whole entire night. Hostesses make mistakes. I remember new girl was running the floor and she messed up. She put a walk-in on a VIP table. That specific VIP came in and wanted to sit at his table. He got so upset and we lost a client because of that. The littlest possible thing as sitting at a specific table, this guy got so upset about it. We had over 325 seats in this restaurant. It wasn’t only just the guests, you got the servers yelling at you because of their table counts. The hostess was a punching bag for everyone.
I think that bussers do not get enough credit for what they do. Restaurants would fall apart without having that third hand to assist with everything. I had to make sure that tables were ready so that the next couple can sit. The turn-time had to be quick. I also ran a lot of the food out especially if they were big parties. Servers need that third hand. You always assisted with whatever task someone gave you in order to make sure that the night ran smoothly.
Restaurants should pay their employees more because the job is hard. We aren’t servants. We are people who are here to make money and make sure your night goes well.
