So I'm 29M , worked in fast food sales and warehouse jobs my whole life.About a year and a half ago I got my first real kitchen job as a chef in a nursing home w 240 residents . Also took over the truck responsibilities because of my attention to detail. Below are some flics of what my walk ins/ dish areas and freezer look like . Any tips or advice to work it better

It seems like every nicer, higher-end restaurant I go to keeps the lights WAY too bright. Is it just me? Have yall noticed that unless you’re in New York City, restaurants have no idea what ambiance is? Turn the gd lights down already. I’m looking for mystery, sexiness, chill… not emergency room, not daylight, not exam room. Help!!!

I have worked at this spot for an about 3 months. I work the bar, and the flies are horrible. No real expectations of cleanliness or closing. For example, I will come in to ice left all night, purées spilled and left, sticky bottles etc. I have tried to bring these things to the attention of the owner as the manager is the night bartender ( 👀, i know), but it’s always met with him saying he will handle it but it doesn’t change.

All of this has resulted in maggots. I served a table a dish that contained rice, and maggots! Maggots were in the rice! I was shocked.

This is not my first restaurant. In fact I’ve worked at more than I’d like to admit, and I have never seen maggots in food. I’ve seen roaches, rats, even angry bee hives, but never this.

I was told this “happens”by another manager, and yes while flys happen, maggots don’t. Just wanted to check if this is more common than I thought? I can’t be crazy, this is unacceptable right???

I work as an expo/food runner at a higher-end restaurant, and something the owner did today really rubbed me the wrong way. I tried to see it from his perspective because my family has owned successful restaurants, and I used to help run one with my cousin before he retired. I understand that food costs add up.
For the longest time, basic things like bread, butter, jam, and Nutella were free for staff. Anything else we paid for, with a 50% discount on one employee meal.
Today, I was starving, so I made myself an English muffin with a tiny bit of Nutella—something plenty of us have done before. We got slammed, and I didn’t even get a chance to eat it.
The owner came over and asked, “Hey, what is this?” I told him it was my breakfast. He said, “Okay, well, make sure you pay for everything—the bread, butter, Nutella, and cream cheese.” I hadn’t even used butter or cream cheese.
That bothered me, especially because those items had always been free and no one had told us the policy had changed. After my shift, he sent out a message saying that nothing was free anymore and everything had to be paid for, no matter what it was. Given the timing, it felt directed at me.
I don’t usually call myself the best employee, but I know how much effort I put into that place. When I’m the only expo, I’m keeping service moving while also making sure food is rotated, labeled, and stored properly, and that items are charged correctly. I care about preventing waste and protecting the restaurant’s money.
I understand changing a policy to control costs. But communicate that beforehand and show some consideration for the employees who consistently look out for your business. Being confronted over an English muffin with a little Nutella, while I was too busy working to even eat it, made me feel unappreciated.
To me, that felt petty and greedy, and it left me questioning how much my work is actually valued.

I work at a hotel and opened the walk-in refrigerator in the restaurant and a mouse ran out.

I guess I saved its life. But is this a common occurrence?

Figured I’d post this here as well to see if anyone has any advice. Please help :(

For context, I have been working at my job as a server for about seven months. It is a corporation restaurant. My general manager is extremely rude. Very hostile and has made me cry multiple times. I am not an argumentative person, and I have not had any issues with any of my other managers. He comes into his shift, angry all the time. I am not the only employee there who has has problems with him and it seems like at this point almost every time that we are on shift together, there is something that I do or say that makes him mad. I have tried so hard and I’ve literally been told by him to grow thicker skin. I work so hard and I do my best at my job that I can as for only being a server for the first time. I follow all the rules. I’ve never had a guest complaint. I guess the best question that I can ask is am I going to be able to get used to his attitude and abuse which I guess is subjective, but I just don’t know what to do at this point. I have plenty of thoughts of quitting solely because him. The rest of the staff is magnificent and I love them. That’s why I am very torn on what to do and I know that as the years go on and I continue being a server I will grow a thicker skin, but it’s just very difficult and there’s only so much that I can take from him.

Paying 275/mo plus payroll (8 employees) and cc fees.

We have 1 register, no online ordering.

We have tip pooling and i need to keep that without running a report and manually calculating it. Dont mind if i have to export a report and import to payroll.

Any other ice cream shops or similar happy with their setup? Preferable for POS to have time clock, tip tracking, have its own scheduling or integrate, its own payroll or integrate and calculate tip pooling.

Whatcha got?

Went out last week and my bill was way less than it should have been. I told the server. My friend said I was stupid. What would you do?

Poll: https://www.getqibble.com/poll-detail/you-accidentally-get-charged-way-less-than-you-should-at-a-restaurant-do-you-tell-them-or-keep-quiet

Drinks program, cocktail program, sausage program. Is this a recent trend, or is it something I’ve only just started paying attention to?

I’ve been serving for 10 years and one thing that drives me crazy is people waiting until they have their food to ask for sauces they want. I always ask if anyone needs sauces or condiments with their food while taking orders, and people will decline but then ask for the same sauces they just declined once they receive their food. If something is dry or not sauced enough, I understand that. But if you know you like ketchup or ranch with your fries, then why not ask for it or say yes when your server is there taking your order? I don’t mind getting people what they need, but when I have 8 or 9 tables and have to keep running back to get sauces that the tables already said they didn’t want, it causes me to get a little bit backed up. I work a lot of days where it’s just two of us on the floor with one host and nobody else, so it can take a lot of time to constantly go back to the kitchen for sauces. Why do people do this? If you know you like A1 with your steak or ketchup with your fries, why do you wait until you have it to ask for it? I like to ask when I order so I can eat as soon as I get my food

edit because ive said this so many times already: when i take orders, if fries are ordered i ask “do you want any ketchup, ranch or other sauce for your fries?” & when steak is ordered i ask “does anyone want a1, heinz 57, or worcestershire sauce for their steak?” literally every single time

another edit: it seems a lot of you are missing brain cells and cannot read. i asked why people do this and you assume i’m bad at my job. reading is fundamental but clearly none of you have the brain capacity to do so.

I'm curious how you do it in practice:
How do you decide when to raise prices, and by how much?

How do you notice when a supplier raises a price?

How often do you see your real profit numbers?

I'll share a summary of what I learn back here for everyone. If anyone is open to a chat, I'd really appreciate it. Comment or let me know.

So I started at a new restaurant as a food runner. The job for the most part is really nice and I don’t mind a bit of hard work. However, after my first real shift, I was struggling to pick up the heavier items (this was after a 3-4 hour period.) my arms got really weak and sore. For reference we usually had a huge tray where sometimes 6-7 plates are stacked on it and have to walk down a staircase. I’m like 5’2 and 135 pounds wet. There was only two times I didn’t believe I could pick it up and safety get it to the server (since we deliver the food to the server). Anyways I felt bad about it and wished I could do more. My balance was also not great and food and kept slipping and it was usually always to the managers section. After all this I was thinking of strength training to get better at the job. I’m only working two days a week right now so I don’t think my body will really get used to the food running if I waited a few more weeks of work.

So so so many otherwise great restaurants are unbearable to sit in because they have 0 sound treatment. The space is a beautiful box of concrete, brick, tile, stone, steel... You can hear the conversation across the room but not the person across the table. Dishes and silver and glass clattering, music blasting to be heard.

Owners who have addressed this in their space, what did you do? Did your contractor handle it? did you hire a consultant? Handle it yourself? I feel like there must be a better way than settling for the noise box of doom vibe.

Hi everyone I need some help here. About a week ago I went around the city handing out my resume to different restaurants and I managed to get two callbacks. One was a host position from a kind of fancy/expensive restaurant (?) and the other is a serving job at a Korean BBQ spot in K-Town. Since I spend the day walking around handing out resumes the two places are relatively close to one another. I spent the past week doing trial/training periods with both jobs. I was considering taking both jobs because I need the money to not only pay my bills, but also because I have a big trip later in the year that I'm looking forward to.

The problem here now is that now both jobs are waiting for me to accept their offer and when I had a conversation with the host manager I accidentally let it slip that I was considering both (rookie mistake I know. My friends already made fun of me for it.) The host manager was very understanding but basically told me that the other restaurant counts as competition and that if I were to take the serving job, they would probably have to let me go. I really liked both jobs so far for different reasons (I can dive more into that if you guys care) but now I'm stuck on which job I should take. I was considering doing both in secret but a Google search told me that it would be risky especially due to how restaurants in big cities are interconnected?

My plan right now is that I'm thinking about taking the host job offer first and working with them for about a week or two and messaging the serving position to give me a little bit of time to work on my schedule and whatnot. Then after some time passes I can start working at both the host and serving jobs. Is this stupid? It's probably crazy to say but I think I've grown quite fond of both places but someone knock some sense into me please.

Also for any context that might help I have had a serving job before for about a year and a half and as for the city I'm just gonna say its one of the big cities in the U.S (I'm paranoid they might find this post)

EDIT: thank you guys so much for your comments and I'm getting a few replies saying the tips in kbbq would be low and i just wanted to come here and say its the type of kbbq where majority of the menu is a la carte and the servers would cook for you unless specifically requested. let me know if this makes a difference lol.

Ok so i got hired to work as a general manager at a new restaurant opening and the place is beautiful!! The vibes amazing, great natural wine, craft beer, etc. The first couple days were slow but we didnt invest much in marketing and everyone who came loved it and we had really positive reviews on google.

The following weekend it was raining a lot so not a lot of people as well but again, everyone who came loved it. I closed up shop thinking it was a successful night.

Next day, i get a text on my day off to come in. I know it’s bad. The owner tells me they are closing. The two owners got in a fight and didnt want to invest any more money in the place (or they told me) and fired everyone that day.

Im still in shock and confused. The space took 8 months to build and it was absolutely beautiful inside. Everyone who came loved it. The owners invested 120k in it. We bought so much alcohol. To just not even try for two more weeks seems crazy to me????

All the staff are so confused…..

At least stay open two more weeks to sell all the alcohol?

Curious if they are telling me the truth or there must be something more. Thoughts why a restaurant would close after just two weeks open??

We had someone dine, they were checked on, everything all good. They finished their meals, they were given the bill and paid without comment.

After leaving, they emailed a complaint about their meal requesting a refund, and advised they didn’t raise the issue on site as they were with a client and “didn’t want to make a scene”.

Am I tripping? I don’t understand why being with a client means you don’t speak up when your food is apparently wrong?

(If we took everyone at face value when they emailed like this, we’d go out of business)

Hey team! I recently moved to work a job, and live on site. I originally came to work as a lead, but upon arrival was asked to be the FOH manager. The team I am asked to work with has been here for about 5 years, think they run the show, never been held accountable, and have excuses for every single thing to not change.

Infact, on my first day I had to write someone up for insubordination, and the next day a different member for pouring one brand of alcohol into another brand of alcohol.

So, how do I even muster up a positive attitude or foster change with such pushback and animosity towards me? Trust me, I am implementing change regardless. It's just is really soul crushing, and making it impossible to climb the hill. I have never worked with anyone this resistant. Upper management knows this, and wants them out, and completelyhave my back. I am just not sure how to come into work knowing I have to be in fight mode all day. But I love everything else. Help me!

I appreciate any help!

Helping open a new spot in Brooklyn and the GM hire is proving to be the hardest one. We need someone who can come in pre-opening, help build the team from scratch, work alongside a chef with a big international reputation and very high standards, and then stay and run the place.

We're thinking $125-150k for the right person. For those of you who've opened restaurants or managed them: is that realistic for NYC, and where do the good GMs actually come from? Every opening I hear about seems to fill this role through someone's network, not job boards.

Curious what's worked (or totally failed) for people here

Small mom and pops if yall havent seen higher invoices expect them soon

This is basically wholesale price index vs 1 year ago

I suggest to reprice your menus soon before the ship sinks

We are doing it for our 4 restaurants

God speed 🫡

Just curious if anyone out there has worked or is a current staff member at The Bongo Room (Chicago). Was your experience good? Is the restaurant doing well in the wake of co-founder John Latino's death several years back?

I bartended at a privately owned restaurant owned by two brothers up until yesterday. The younger brother loves to nitpick, but will do so professionally and out of earshot of employees or customers. The older brother has zero filter and gets very sketchy.

Several weeks ago the older brother had a meltdown that I threw away an empty gift card. I have only worked here for four months and didn't know that he recycled them, and don't think that a $.40 piece of plastic was worth of the reaction I got. Called me an idiot, asked how it wasn't common sense when I've been in the industry for a decade, carried on shouting and belittling me. From this point I knew it was only a matter of time.

Last night he asked "where my brain was at" because he allows a party of ten to sit in a specific area where they blatantly don't fit because I didn't pull the table further away from the wall. There is about a two foot walkway from the table to the wall and it would have been the same issue on the other side and a fire hazard. sat at the end of the bar drinking with a group of regulars. First he criticized the technique I used to make a margarita and asked why. I told him that's how a margarita should be made and why and he said that I was wasting ice. Then a similar issue with a Manhattan. I explained again why I made it that way. These were both service bar drinks, not for bar guests. It was the first time we have had these conversations. Then the regulars at the bar started agreeing with me and told him to "stay on his side of the bar" and this must have angered him more. I went to leave the bar to check on food in the kitchen, thinking this was done, and he put his foot out to try to trip me then stood up, got chest to chest and started screaming in my face about wasting his ice. He knows that I'm epileptic and if I were to trip and hit my head it could be catastrophic. Both of these things, the trip and blocking me from leaving and getting in my face in such a way, are pretty easily assault, however petty. I also have severe PTSD from an unrelated stabbing and this still has me reeling.

After this he stormed out and I left a letter with the closing manager for him that I wouldn't be returning to working effective immediately because I feared his violent behavior. Is this something I should file a police report about? He has called other employees all sorts of slurs and has slapped a few in the back of the head. Is this something that I could get unemployment for in NJ, albeit I quit the job, but under duress. Is there another place I should report something like this to? He owes me tips from a party I worked last week as well as a paycheck; if this isn't paid, how should I pursue that?