Thursday, June 1, 2017
Today's Specials:
MARKETING: Best Promotional Items for Restaurants
A successful restaurant marketing mix includes promotional products that fit the establishment’s image and are useful to its target customers. Here are tips for choosing the best restaurant promo items.
DID YOU KNOWs…
Cretins Not Welcome
A bar sign has since gone viral created to ward off creepy dudes that hit on the female bartenders. Since tweeting the photo, the sign has been shared over 23,000 times.
This is definitely our favourite sign in the bar. Also if dudes could stop trying to kiss our female bartender's hands that would be great. pic.twitter.com/C1Lf8KNe1Q
— Beer Cellar Exeter (@BeerCellarExe) May 25, 2017
Lemme See Ya Grill
In honor of Memorial Day starting our week, GrubStreet provided us with examples of why we need to be careful lighting the BBQ. Here is a collection of epic grilling FAILS from the long weekend. And yes, eyebrows do grow back.
What's Good Alexa?
Amazon’s line of smart speakers (aka Alexa) allows you to have your own personal robot in your house with all the answers. This infographic from Statista shows how smart speaker owners use the device in their day-to-day. You’d be surprised where food ordering is on the list.
WORKING FULL TIME AND STILL HOMELESS
Why it matters to you: fast food workers are calling on top chains to raise the minimum wage where lawmakers have "failed them."
Fast food workers have experienced a range of difficulties from fighting for a fair wage to combating hazardous working environments. The latest story regarding this problem is a former McDonald’s worker, Kenya Banks, who became homeless after falling ill and being unable to keep up with the low pay and increasing hours. As a 43-year-old mother and full-time worker at McDonald’s, she was barely able to make ends meet before she was diagnosed with a fibroid condition causing her medical bills to pile up. This was one of the stories told at a fight for $15 protest that gathered outside a McDonald’s shareholders meeting for what many are calling the “March on McDonald’s.”
“As the second largest employer in the world, McDonald’s can step in where our state lawmakers have failed us,” Banks wrote in an op-ed published by Civil Eats. Multiple fast food workers are looking at McDonald’s to pave the way for other fast food chains to recognize the struggle of working for a fair wage. Other controversial stories involve many fast food workers disclosing that some can’t even afford to eat fast food in the first place based on their low pay. As a result, many minimum-wage workers in all industries are living beyond their means and are calling on top chains to make a change. The average minimum wage as of 2015 in the U.S is $7.25 per hour.
CAN'T END TIPPING
Why it matters to you: restaurants have not been able to successfully end the tipping system.
The tipping debate has caused controversy in the restaurant industry for years now. Some establishments believe that tipping is an unfair practice that puts servers ahead of the back of house staff whereas others believe the tipping is a fair practice that shouldn’t be changed. It’s been less than a year since the Oregon-based restaurant, Le Pigeon and Little Bird Bistro decided to enforce a no-tipping policy and as of last week, they have reinstated tipping. The original deal was that they would raise food and beverage prices an average of 20 percent to include tip, but unfortunately, the higher prices were too much for some diners. The prices are now reduced to not include the tip and it will now be given manually.
This restaurant made a vast effort to change the system which is incredibly noteworthy. Unfortunately, the tipping system is so ingrained in the restaurant industry that it becomes incredibly difficult to interject a new structure. According to a tipping expert and professor at Cornell University of Hotel and Administration, there is really no obvious solution to the problem. "The biggest reason for restaurateurs to keep tipping is that it allows them to reduce menu prices, which increases demand." He goes on to recommend that restauranteurs look at the level of difference between employees specifically BOH and FOH, and replace the tipping system if this is where “the highest pay discrepancies exist.”
