What is the Worst (hardest?/most unpleasant?) part of Opening a Restaurant?

Have to admit , David hired alot of Indians, they feel proud, love their work and try hard to show their worth..........

IDK about America or how you can do this...

But I am figgering you will find the answer and work it as it's your passion and you can not fail, based on your dream.

There is an answer you will find it.

My best employees have always been immigrants of various legal status. People who are willing to leave everything they know behind and start from scratch have everything to gain from hard work and everything to lose if they fail. It has nothing to do wages in these situations, it's getting the right personality and often that type of personality is what makes one an immigrant in the first place. I just wish we had easier laws or programs to let these people work here if they want to. But first we have to admit that Americans don't want to do most of these long hours, hard labor types of jobs. I've had young Americans leave my employment to make 1/2 of what I pay because they would rather stand around in air conditioning all day folding shirts at Old Navy or ringing up purchases at Target.

The common thread so far for me is the best workers are those who have a strong desire to either get out of their parents house or not to go back to it.....they have pride and a desire for independence. Those who are at college and expect the world to be their oyster after graduation or those who live at home with mom and dad and are fine with the situation have never yet been willing to work hard and meet my standards for excellence.

I for instance had one 34 yo guy who has always lived at home, who had been out of work for 5 months, whos last job had been contract state cafeteria cooking working for a known bitch. I thought that he would be greatful to get in at the ground floor of a great operation making reasonably good money and with a strong chance of becoming a manager because I made it clear that I am going to open new stores and when I do I intend to promote from with-in rather than hire people I dont know to be my managers. I assumed that he was a down on his luck guy who was waiting for his chance to make it in life. He walked out on me during our first major rush, apparently having not believed me when I told him from day 1 that we were going to get busy. He came in, complained for 20 minutes about how much work there was to do, then walked out the back door with out even saying a word.

When I was hiring for my law firm, in another century,
it did not occur to me to inquire qua the housing accomodations
of attorneys or support staff, nor their parental relationships.
I figured that thay will either work out well, or not.
I can handle both.

I take a different vu of living in the family home.
When my family returned to NY from Arizona, I was 13.
We bawt some real estate.
I took 1 of the apartments (the best one).
I was happy. I had everything that I wanted and no problems.
It has never occurred to me to leave, tho I might possibly
retire to Florida. My living arrangements had no effect
upon my practice of law, nor upon the competent maintenance
of my fiduciary relationships to my clients.





David

You may like or hate this article, but might also relate to some aspects of it -

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/03/24/080324fa_fact_macfarquhar

If I restate the question to "running a restaurant" then the answer is labor. This has been a constant problem though it is getting better to the point that I only have one position where I am not happy. I have also been through 4 people in that position in the last month.

key findings:

nobody over 30 years old has been worth a damn. Every. Single. One. of them either has an emotional problem or a drug problem which make them useless.

very few people over 25 are worth a damn

18-25 year olds make up almost all of my staff but:

1) it is very difficult to find one who is willing and able to work, can get out of bed and come to work ontime on a regular basis, will even try to come to work most days, and so on. I run through on average 3 before I find a keeper.

2) even the good ones often need constant care and feeding, which is super annoying to this old guy from the mid-west who was brought up in a family where the ethos was "suck it up and get the work done". I do it because I have to do it to keep good people, but it annoys me.

other observations:

artistic people are good at customer service

the most tattooed and pierced up hot chicks have the best combination of customer service skills and work ethic of anybody

university girls are to be avoided at all cost....constant drama and zero willingness to work...with them it is always whine, whine, whine and then they quit, often in dramatic fashion.

girls who have never been to university are the best girls to hire

cook wantabe's who have been to culinary school, even really crappy ones, are to be avoided

at the top of my list for what I am looking for in a prospect now is smarts, and second for customer service people is that people like them. Everything else I can teach. Only one slow witted guy has made it, and it is because he is customer service and everyone loves him immediately (me included), all of the rest of the dummies have been washouts, often costing me a lot of wasted money in training.

I care very little about experience anymore.

increasingly my best new hires are referred to me by current hires. current hires know me and what is required to make it in my place, and they will flat out tell me not to hire friends of theirs who applied but who they feel are not right for the job.

Mexicans make great kitchen staff (this I knew a long time ago)

How 's business ???

a bit off mid summer, lots of slow days with periodic great days, but the last few weeks have been solidly super even with the gas prices going sky high fast. I see a lot of places not doing too well though, it seems that people are still spending but are picky about where they spend it, a trend that has been gaining speed rapidly since the recession hit.

Around here I am finally beginning to see a number of restaurants close with no one replacing them, something that I expected to see over a year ago. There are far too many restaurants given the ever decreasing disposable income, and even the dreamers are getting leery about opening a place. we just had one idiot open a stupid business plan place and lose $200k in just 6 months before closing, that kind of thing puts a chill in the air.

If thay go under,
shall u be willing to service their former customers ???????

sure, but most folks go out less now, and spend less when they go out. unlike you they dont have it to spend and dont want to go more into debt with credit cards.

only the best will live and make money. I am one of them.

Do u pay them enuf to motivate them ???

hawkeye, as a business owner, if I can say. Don't ever put down those who do it wrong, rather feel sorry for them.. I mean seriously, you are learning from all of their mistakes to ensure your own success.

You obviously are watching carefully as to what they are doing wrong and ensuring you don't go down their path , so aren't they teaching you something?

Just saying.

You could always make one wrong move and become one of them, a statistic that failed.

Best wishes.. I am glad it's going good thus far.

the problem with your theory is that every single time I have tried to give an alleged down on their luck person a break I have gotten fucked.... the former drug user who is clean but really not, the homeless person who needed a job to fix their life but who disappears and then when they come for the paycheck has a convoluted excuse for why it was not their fault, or the cook who just needed someone to give him a chance but who in the first day makes it clear all he really wants to do is wash dishes, or the guy who admits that he has often been fired for attitude problems and is now reformed but who it is clear fast is not, and so on and so on .........

i more than ever believe that those who fail in life deserve it, and as a winner want to associate with other winners. this is business not a charity operation, or a loser support operation. no work no eat is the Zen way, pull your weight or get out of the way is how I was brought up..... i took a long detour through liberalism and socialism but i am back to that i think.

dont push a hard luck story at me at this point, but give me a young person who wants to get away from their parents house so that they can finally run their own lives.....they are a good bet.

I suggest you stop trying to pigeon hole everyone into narrow categories. I've had my own retail/serive business for 20 years and did a lot of hiring for a Fortune 500 before that. I've had spectacular employees and morons in every category you list here. I think you are experiencing what every business owner goes through - basically few people care about your business the way you do. Really good people end up not working in the service/retail industry after a certain time in the workforce unless they have no other choice. Those that do stay tend not to be the the most motivated or are trapped by a lack of education. Someone who considers himself (herself) a professional server is probably able to work in a high-end or elite type restaurant for the best tips, so the hiring pool for new or mid-level restaurants is limited. I would suggest you start looking for people who have retired from a professional field and are looking to work part-time to support their retirement or ease boredom, at least for some positions. I've found retires have already proven themselves and have the work ethic you want and need. Everyone else is hit and miss on an individual basis, and in your type of business it will mostly be miss.

Get the good ones young...before they figure out something better. The old ones who have been floating around the lower ends of this industry ain't worth a damn...they are in this low paying generally abusive industry because they either can't or won't do better for themselves.

I did try one 55 yo looking for a little extra income...what a disaster, never again, especially since no one ovefr 30 has worked out. I do what works till it no longer works, and so far smart hungry youth is what works.

and will be gone as soon as they figure out one of two things - they can do better at another company or they better get their asses back to school cuz service work pay is **** (just spent 2 days with 3 of these - and my employer (Fortune 500 company) just lost 4 young people from our team of about 30 - all of them, in both groups, decided to go back to school)

One bad egg and you condemn them all. Well, it's your call.

Is anyone coming to you from other restaurants? it reads like they're either coming in from nowhere or, well, nowhere.

In this industry most everyone averages several rotations per position per year...getting 6 months out of anyone counts as a huge win, and young people trying to put together enough money to do something with their lives almost always need a year or more to get there. My best customer service people are a cute young girls who are either trying to get out of the parents house or are trying to get to school. My best cook is a mexican who is trying to get finacially indipendent from the parents.none of these people have a better option right now as they are not able to pay for school yet or have enough money for a lease. Plus this is a fun place to work and they average almost $13 an hour which is hard to beat even in washington in this economy. Plus I treat people fair which is not that common in this industry.

My best people are going no where anytime soon.