Saturdays in the restaurant business are often rough.
Unlike normal weekdays, you're unlikely to get regulars or businessmen.
Source: Pixabay.com
When I see six guys in black suits and ties walk in during the week, I get excited because I know that they have money and they want to eat well.
That doesn't happen on Saturday afternoon.
Instead, you will get a single mother with her five kids.....three of which need a high chair but they still take up prime real estate. Most sections only have one six top table, so if you have a guest that tips $100, or if you have a guest that tips $1.... they're still taking up the same amount of prime real estate for approximately an hour and a half.
Having said that, we are all used to it on Saturdays and Sundays.
The single mother or father that has been waiting all week to be able to go out to a nice restaurant and has no recourse but to bring her small children? I can dig it.
It's a weekend thing.
We also get a lot of unusual customers during the weekend.
Serious jerks who actually call people stupid, complain for no reason other than to try and get a free meal, and do everything in their power to subvert the system.
People that come in during the week don't have time for that but on the weekend you can be assured to find all of the cracks in the system.
Nevertheless, the weekend is a great time to make money. We just have to set our expectations at the right level.
Today was particularly bad.
Several guests were incredibly insulting. At least two guests tried to get free food by telling lies. Several people weren't getting their drinks fast enough because we only had one bartender and she was going as fast as she could.
High chair after High Chair, booster seat after booster seat, modified order after modified order.
Everyone knows that this is how the weekend works. Everyone's used to it. Even if things are a little bit more difficult than normal you have to be used to those sudden changes as well.
However, once in awhile you will get an employee that is so frustrated by the way things are going then he decides to make things difficult for everyone else.
That happened today.
Three different tables did not tip this server at all so he began to yell at the other servers and caused quite a ruckus.
He blamed his lack of tips on the other service for some reason instead of looking at his own service or the possibility of simple circumstance. "Shit happens."
When bad things happen in your world, you must be very careful not to allow them to affect other people's worlds.
Why?
We are all one society living together.
If I'm suffering, I don't want you to suffer also. What I really want is for you to somehow pull me out of my suffering. All it takes is a few kind words. All it takes is for you to be in a good mood and not be affected by my bad attitude. That means that I can't let my bad attitude become so bad that it destroys your peace.
This is a difficult concept for some people to understand. Especially people in the restaurant industry because not everyone is completely emotionally there when they are rushing from table to table. I can't blame them for that either.
However, there's an old adage that a bad apple spoils the bunch and when it comes to the workplace this is definitely true.
A bad attitude in the workplace can make being at work a difficult experience especially on the weekends when things are already tough.
A bad apple in the workplace spoils the bunch.