Tag: money

On Third Party Delivery Services

This post is currently making the rounds

Having worked in one such service years ago I can confirm how the math is done. No matter what service you go with, a restaurant stands to make cents of “profit” for every dollar of sales, while the costs are that much higher for the customer. It’s getting to the point where local and state governments are starting to look into it.

The percentages are lopsided to heavily favor the services themselves, and that’s by design. A lot of people have commented on this fact in a lot of places.

Do the right thing: pick up the phone and call the restaurant directly— yes, it will mean talking to someone (the horror!) but it usually will result in you (as the guest) developing a relationship with the restaurant itself. This is a good thing. You want to save your favorite restaurant, right? This is what you have to do.

A small sacrifice to help not only the restaurant itself, but the people working there.

Under Pressure

Just like the song. The governor extended the stay-at-home order until May 18.

The restaurant industry in our state is reeling. You can go from basic PR announcements to personal stories, but the facts are stark: Our industry is bleeding dry due to the pandemic and from the looks of it the amount of help we’ll get is going to be severely limited.

All you have to do is look at the federal response.The National Restaurant Association put out a report and the numbers are depressing, to say the least:

  • Nationwide, sales were down 47% during the period from March 1 to March 22
  • 54% of restaurant operators have switched to off-premises service only
  • Seven in 10 operators have had to lay off employees and reduce the number of hours worked
  • Roughly half of them anticipate more layoffs and hourly reductions over the next 30 days
  • More than six in 10 said they’ve had to reduce their operating hours

Yes, I know the entire planet is looking at the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, but we can still hope for a better future while being sad about what we’re losing.

The end of a golden era in bars and restaurants.

Fodder: Scab Salt

Source: Salt Bae’s Meat Empire Is Rife With Labor Problems – VICE

Apparently this is something Salt Bae has dragged along with him from before he even his the meme big leagues in addition to accusations of sexism, racism, willfully ignoring health violations, etc etc etc. That’s before the most substantial accusation of them all: That his food is just bad.

The industry is already notorious for intensely disliking union and those that would push a union agenda in a restaurant and what unionizing would do to a business, whether the fears that are real or imagined. There are multiple pros and cons for each and we are not going to go into those in this post.

The choice quote of the Vice article:

Kucur talked about Gökçe’s obsession with Scarface: “He was so influenced by the movie. He thinks he is like Tony Montana. He said to me, ‘What’s the name on the restaurant? Nusr-Et. What’s my name? Nusret. What I say, goes.'”

We should all be so fortunate if the fireworks are even a smidgen like in the finale of the movie.