Calificaciones, capacitación y asesoramiento.

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Using a structured guide, interviewers asked employers about industry trends, business strategies, workplace practices, and the role of immigrants in the restaurant industry. Table 4.1 shows the profile of employers that we interviewed. Two out of three employers interviewed had over a decade of industry experience. The employer perspectives that were shared with us were based on 391 cumulative years of restaurant industry experience.

In the following section, the voices of restaurant employers are laid out and the challenges they face de- scribed. Employers often felt that employee turnover and productivity are pivotal factors in the restaurant busi- ness. Many employers asserted that setting fair wages, benefits, and opportunities for advancement are essential for creating the employee satisfaction that results in a successful business. Nonetheless, many employers also stated that these high-road conditions are not standard in the industry, and four were forthright that they them- selves break wage and hour laws. Some restaurant owners complained that employers who violate the law unfairly compete with law-abiding employers. Lastly, a select few employers showed that the high road to profitability is possible. These high-road employers benefit by setting employment practices that create satisfied, pro- ductive workers that remain with the restaurant.

External Factors Affecting Workplace Practices

To better understand the dynamics that affect both employers and workers in the Philadelphia restau- rant industry, it is important to consider the salient external pressures on restaurants. The employers we interviewed referred to several factors that impact their business practices, including customer demand for sustainable and healthy food, stiff competition, and the Great Recession.

Employers asserted that the Great Recession has resulted in consumers being more value-conscious in Philadelphia. The majority of the employers we interviewed believe that consumers subsequently began frequenting casual or quick serve restaurants more than fine dining establishments. A quick serve man- ager with 4½ years’ industry experience stated, “I’ve seen fine dining struggle more than quick service.” We also found that restaurant employers reacted in a number of ways to weather the crisis, includ- ing lowering prices and creating deals to accommodate budgets, as well as downgrading the formality of restaurants to create a more casual setting. One casual restaurant manager with 24 years’ industry experience explained the importance of perception of menu and price: “yelp will kill you if [consumers] don’t have a good perceived value of the menu.” A casual restaurant manager with 23 years’ industry experience stated his restaurant company had responded to the market shift by opening a casual restau- rant. “Definitely since 2000 when we opened here, there has been a shift in where people eat, going from formal to casual.… We actually opened up as a more casual restaurant just at the right time”

Employers reported concerns with the Great Recession, but they also responded with diverse busi- ness strategies to weather the storm. These responses from interviewed employers are consistent with the findings of Chapter II, which show continued growth in the restaurant industry despite the recession.

Restaurant employers are also catering to consumer demand for healthier, more environmentally

DEMOGRAPHIc PROFILE OF EMPLOYERS’ SURVEYED NO. | % OF EMPLOYERS

Industry segment Fine dining 4 | 13% Casual Restaurants 15 | 50% Fast Food/ Quick serve 9 | 30%

Bars 2 | 7%

position Owner 6 | 20%

manager / General manager 24 | 80%

Gender male 20 | 67%

Female 9 | 30%

non-identifying 1 | 3%

length of time in Industry less than 1 year 0 | 0%

1-3 years 3 | 10%

3-6 years 2 | 7%

6-10 years 5 | 17%

more than 10 years 20 | 67%

source: philadelphia Restaurant Industry Coalition interview data

cHARAcTERISTIcS OF INTERVIEWED EMPLOYERS

33 friendly, or locally sourced food. A quick serve restaurant owner with 2½’ years’ industry experience

asserted, “We’ve gone to more grass-roots, locally sourced—all those hit terms. I think that’s definitely not so much the trend as just the way the food industry has evolved.”

Employers also remarked that the labor pool has generally increased in age, with a greater number of applicants. One manager with 8 years’ of experience observed that the labor pool had “gotten wider and older.” Another manager with 24 years’ of experience remarked that “there’s a lot more career serv- ers and they are thinking of healthcare and they are thinking about the sustainability of the restaurant whereas before it was a lot of young wait staff that didn’t have those concerns.”

Strategies for Profit

To deal with the external pressures outlined above, employers generally agreed that one of the most im- portant elements is human capital; reducing employee turnover and increasing employee productivity are critical ingredients to creating long-term profitability.

minimizing turnoVEr

Turnover is hugely reliant on how you treat your staff. I’ve heard terrible things about the way people are treated. I’ve been a part of that. I’ve been sexually harassed, which is rampant in this industry. If you’re not showing that you respect [staff] and try to cultivate an atmosphere of mutual respect, then they are going to go. Like Danny Meyer [a famous restaurateur] said, ‘You have to treat your staff like they are volunteers, because they can

always go right down the street to a different restaurant and make the same amount of money.

—manager, casual restaurant, 24 years’ experience

In interviews, employers reported that they valued quality staff and deplored employee turnover. Con- sistent personable service is key to establishing a loyal customer base, which is in turn a cornerstone of consistent restaurant profit. One casual restaurant manager with 24 years’ experience told us, “People want to see the same faces when they come in; its vital. If there is a new person who doesn’t have that knowledge, they are not going to be as comfortable as they would be with a seasoned server. Knowledge makes workers faster too.” One quick serve manager with 10 years’ industry experience asserted that there is not only added benefit to keeping good employees, but there is also a cost to losing them. She stated that turnover “is very negative because you train somebody to do something and then you lose them, and then go train another person. It just decreases profitability.” Similarly, a quick serve general manager with 12 years’ industry experience stated, “Turnover is crucial and there’s a lot of reasons for that, but our outlook is that the less people that I have to hire and train, the less money I spend doing it.” Employers recognized the importance of keeping employees happy in order to decrease employee turnover. Some of their strategies to retain workers include training, promoting from within, paying decent wages, and providing other perks ranging from workplace benefits to staff meals and drinks. A quick serve general manager with 12 years’ industry experience added that paying his employees good wages and giving an occasional raise is one strategy he employs to keep turnover low, “I would rather give somebody an extra quarter an hour than have to find a new employee or just have a disgruntled employee, like a quarter an hour is not going to kill my profit. It will probably increase my profit because that person is going to have higher output and a better attitude.”

In addition, many employers cited the overall importance of creating a positive work environ- ment, a sense of family, and stable scheduling. One casual dining restaurant manager with 24 years’

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industry experience told us that they keep turnover low “by keeping everyone happy and giving everyone a voice. That means at the end of their shift, asking them, ‘How did everything go today? Is there anything that we need to change?’ Open door and open dialogue.” A bar manager said that it was as simple as providing her employees with schedules a month in advance, accommodating their requests, and fostering mutual respect for one another.

A quick serve owner with 2½ years’ experience put it simply: “Don’t be an idiot. Just think, ‘Where would I want to work?’” WORKER PRODUCTIvITy

You got to treat your employees well. If you don’t treat them well then you’re gonna lose business, bottom line.… You can have the best stuff in the world, but if you treat your employees—and then vicariously your customers—like

crap and you don’t care about them, you got nothing.

—general manager, Quick serve, 12 years’ experience

Interviewed employers unanimously reported that worker productiv- ity is critical to running an effective and profitable business. Many believe that investing in workers—in terms of wages, working con- ditions, training, and opportunities for advancement—is the most effective way to keep workers productive.

A manager of a casual restaurant with 8 years’ industry experience argued that the best way to inspire workers to be productive was to promote from within the restaurant. He told us, “the owners are good at making you work for your money… with the hope of moving up. They promote from within so it gives you a reason to work harder.”

One bar owner and manager with 11 years’ industry experience emphasized that worker and customer satisfaction are directly related to workers’ wages: “I try to make sure that there is a sufficient amount of money allocated to staff every shift so that they feel grateful and they feel like coming back… there should be a certain minimum wage that should definitely be a living wage.”

Contradictions in Theory and Practice

“Litigation is a big issue for the restaurant industry. It’s one that the National Restaurant Association

has worked on for years and always will.”

—John gay, senior vice president of government affairs and public policy for the national restaurant association16

While many employers interviewed asserted that there is a direct con-

Turnover Costs in the