A World Without Tips

A world without tips

I am still incredibly grateful for my recent guest post on tipping.  It inspired my response that discussed the economics of tipping.  It also raised a few other interesting points that I am now learning are common misconceptions about restaurants.  For people who have never worked in a restaurant, these misconceptions can easily be mistaken as facts.  Upon further consideration they may not be wise to pursue.  One interesting idea that she raised in the post was raising the wages paid to server by restaurants to replace tipping.  While on the surface it seems quite logical, it would have a disastrous impact on the industry.

Restaurants are operated on incredibly thin profit margins.  As discussed in a previous post, large corporate restaurant chains are extremely susceptible to anything that affects their stock prices. With a huge spike in the cost of labor, restaurant stock prices would crumble.  Independent restaurant owners struggling to stay afloat would shutter.  Consumers would lose choices.  A vast majority of restaurants would survive this initial wave, but be forced into the next step.

The remaining restaurants would set a wage for servers considerably lower than what the servers make now.  Professional servers with years of experience would have to settle for the new rate or venture into a new career field.  Between servers quitting and terminations, restaurants would reduce the size of their server staff by about a third.  Servers who worked four table sections before would now be required to work six tables for less money.  This would reduce the damage to the restaurant’s bottom line, but also drastically reduce the quality of service that was provided to guests.

Read the full post at Tips For Improving Your Tips

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Recommended Reading 11/1

I promise nothing this boring is on the list

In my continuing attempt to find a good Monday feature, I have decided to share some of the more fun or interesting things I have read over the last week.  I’m not really putting a minimum number of in because I don’t want to ever post filler.  These are just random restaurant related articles that I have found or were sent to me that I thought were worth passing along.  I will gage by what is clicked the kinds of stuff the majority seem interested in and will try to cater the list to it.  Let’s give it a shot.

Read the full post at Tips For Improving Your Tips

Weird Restaurant Stories 10/16

The deliberations are done.  From hundreds of qualifiers, forty made the first cut.  The second cut took us to eighteen.  After a couple of hours of eliminations, I have the top twelve stories that happened in restaurants this week.  Here are the winners.

Read the full post at Restaurant Laughs