Oh, the stupid. It maketh my head hurt.
Valentine's Day was not the raging clusterfuck CL was anticipating. We were absolutely insanely over-staffed. We had three hosts, two expo, two bartenders, three fucking to-go people, nine servers, five managers (all four of ours plus the district manager, wtf?), and I don't even know how many cooks.
Now, I understand it's V Day. And last year, we had five hours in a row of $1000+ sales/hour (which for our restaurant size and pricing is slammin'). But, uh, here's the thing ... last year it was on a Saturday. Apparently when making the schedule, that crucial little difference didn't cross anybody's minds. We really were not any busier than a regular Sunday night! Maybe a smidge. But we had about ten extra people, and it was just ridiculous. I understand preparing; but the problem is that they didn't make cuts when it became apparent we weren't going to get slaughtered.
The three to-go girls? There until 7:30. The two expos? Both there until 8:30. CL and Lapdog thankfully left at around 6. The district manager didn't leave until 7, which was just lovely and stressful. The second bartender was released at 8; the third host at 8; the second host at 8:30. The first round of server cuts didn't come until 8:30 either.
It just seems like they could've planned it just a little bit better. Maybe instead of nine servers, or our regular six, go with seven and a couple of easily cut food runners. Etc. But no, can't do that! Everybody panic!
7 comments:
Eh, it IS better safe than sorry. If it would have gonethe other way, and you were slammed, you'd be thankful. V-day always seems hit or miss.
I'm with you. I always hated it when they overstaffed for holidays or special functions. You know right away you're not making any money.
Were you hit hard on Saturday night? You should have been hit harder last night I would have thought but maybe cause it was Sunday a lot of people opted for the lunch out. Who knows?
They might have treated it like a Saturday because today [Monday] is a holiday [sorry if you are not in the US.]
Still that is incredibly staff. Hope you made some money. :D
CommonWaitress, you're probably right ... I think I'm mostly irritated they wouldn't cut!
DirtyDisher, I knew pretty much as soon as I came in the door I was screwed. I didn't get a table for an hour after I came in.
Waiter E, Saturday was a little slower than normal, actually, and Sunday lunch of dead, dead, dead. Just a weird weekend all around!
SkippyMom, I am in the U.S., and, um, I had NO idea it was President's Day! Maybe that's why business tonight was non-existent. Seriously, one table in the last three hours we were open. Gah!
Personally, I was scheduled to work 6-2. I got to work and soon realized all the normal clientele had been replaced with bitter rude assholes who were mad at the world because they neglected to make reservations in a fining dining restaurant. I offered to go home early, since no one else wanted to leave.
My manager told me I could leave at around 8 after assuring me that it didn't matter that I was scheduled until 2 -he had two more servers that worked until 2 and one that was scheduled until 1.
Well... It did in fact matter because apparently we got insanely busy later in the evening. The poor person who was supposed to be off by 1 had to stay and work over while his girlfriend drank at the bar. LOL.
At least you dodged the bullet. :)
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