New Restaurant Generation

I talk about how I think restaurant staff has changed for the better and the worse...

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to Rock Bottom is the new normal. This is your boy, Ryan. Um, something that I kind of wanted to talk about that kind of like popped back up this week, and I've thought about it before, is in restaurants there's like a definite like defining difference or like a like a change happened. Like a lot of people think that like COVID, COVID like changed the way that you know, like guests come into restaurants, it changed the way that restaurants operate as a whole. Um, and like I'm not saying that it was specifically COVID, but there's like a definite change in, you know, like probably like a change for the better in a lot of parts of it. Um, like I know, you know, like old restaurant style, like I kind of caught the tail end of it in my beginning of my experience where no holes barred, people said whatever they wanted to say to you in the restaurant. Like, you know, cooks were talking to servers, servers are talking, like everyone's talking to everybody, and they're like, you know, like fuck you, you fucking piece of shit. Like they're making sexual comments to each other, like it's a really like hostile because it's really stressful. Like the job's stressful, no matter what part of the restaurant you work in, it's a stressful job. And it used to be like you would just release that stress onto your co-workers, and it made for like a really interesting dynamic between everybody. And you know, I can safely say that like this new generation of restaurant workers are not like that, right? Like it's like the new generation of people. Everyone takes a lot more stuff seriously. People get like offended, not easier, but like it's okay to be offended by bad shit nowadays. Like, if somebody says something fucking heinous to you, you're allowed to be like, nah, like that's not that's not cool, that's not okay. And that's the good part about restaurants changing, right? Like people don't have to live in an uncomfortable environment and they don't have to be uncomfortable when they go to work, and they don't have to worry about you know, getting fucking reamed out by somebody or getting called like a piece of trash by somebody or whatever. But one of the bad things I think about this restaurant change is I think that it just like changed how people feel working in restaurants, or like there's like a certain like like you have to have certain manners to have had worked in restaurants before that I think are lacking nowadays. Uh like when I first moved to Chicago, like I wasn't familiar with because where I learned how to bartend, where I had been bartending, it wasn't like an industry, right? Like it was you just bartended or served or worked in restaurants to survive. Like you didn't really like, you didn't really like care. You were there for a paycheck, you were there to make money. Like, you know, it wasn't like this unreasonable hospitality mindset where like you or like, you know, Anthony Bourdain, Thomas Keller, like it wasn't that mindset where you were trying to do your absolute best and you were trying to put out the absolute best product that you could possibly put out, and you were trying to make your guests feel like they were the only person being taken care of in that entire fucking restaurant. Like you were doing it just to get paid, just to get home, to support your family, to pay your rent, like that kind of shit. So there wasn't like a, I guess there wasn't like a pride in it. And if you told people like back then where I'm from, like if you're a bartender, if you're a server, if you work in a restaurant, people are always like, you know, like what's next? What do you, what do you plan on doing? Like, what's your grown-up job? Which, you know, a lot of us lifers can attest that like restaurants is a grown-up job. This is a fucking career path, and it's one that you should be proud of. It's a fucking huge one, and I'm proud of any, and I'm hype for anyone who wants to do it. Like, I want to do it. This is like what I want to do. And so people where I'm from like weren't about that. They're like, well, you know, like, why don't you go become a builder? Like, why don't you go dig ditches or something? Like, that's a that's a man's job. Why don't why aren't you like doing man work? So there was always that. And then I moved to Chicago, and it's an industry, it's a community, it's a really tight-knit situation. Like I moved there and within weeks, like I knew a lot of other people in the industry, like just coming and goings and stuff, and going out and having them come see you. And then like you build this, like it's almost like a family. And we all had like you either get with it or you're out, pretty much. Like you either get in line with what the restaurant industry is or you're out. That being said, it's you have to have manners, like you have to have, you have to treat everyone exactly how you would like to be treated. You know, like if somebody comes in and they send their food back, or they complain about a drink, or they complain about pricing, or like anything like that, if you're working, you're automatically like, fuck this guy, right? Like you automatically go and you tell other coworkers about this person complaining, or this person who sent something back, or this person that's like a hiccup in just standard service. And so you don't want to be that guy. So you're constantly trying to like you go into restaurants, and back then every restaurant worker did it. You go into restaurants and you make the person serving you feel as comfortable as you want to feel. And like that's kind of like a flip on how people would generally think restaurants operate. And like this, you're organizing your shit, you're not making a mess, you're cleaning up after yourself, you're saying, please, thank you. You don't wave somebody down, you don't flag them down, you don't snap, you don't ask for something overly complicated. If you're asking for a Ramos Gen Fizz, if you're if you're a bartender and you're going out to a bar and you're asking for a Ramos Gen Fizz with a fucking head like this on it, get the fuck out of here. If you're not a real bartender, you're not a real service industry person, you're you're a fucking poser. Because that's just like that's asking the bartender to do something that's so fucking time consuming when they have a million other things that they have to be doing just to operate their own job. Like, have some fucking grace, have have some empathy for the person working. That's how we all used to operate. And that's what made it like this tight-knit community because we all had each other's backs. We were all there for each other. It was like an unspoken bond. It was an unspoken community that we all had. Like we all fucking loved each other. I've noticed in this new restaurant industry that that is out the window. Uh, a lot of these people who work in rest in the restaurants now, even if they have like years under their belt, they don't have that thing. Like they just they don't have that unspoken bond and empathy for the other people who are working. Like me, right? And a lot of people that I know that I'm friends with, they'll go into a place, you know, like an hour, an hour and a half before it closes, and they're like, you know what? No, no, no. Like, you're about to close. I'm not, I'm not gonna bother you with that. Like, I know that you're probably already starting to do your cleanup. No, next time I'll come in a little earlier and then I'll order. It's totally fine, right? Like, that's that's how I think. The restaurant industry people now will go into a place like five minutes before close, and they will sit there and they'll wait to order. And then they'll order complicated shit, they'll send shit back, they'll complain so fucking much. They just complain. They complain about the service that they're getting that late. They're complaining about the food quality that they're getting that late. Like they're ordering food, they're having the kitchen staff make them food after the kitchen is actually closed. And I think that that is so fucking shitty. They'll come in and they will order everything will be fucking clean, right? Espresso machine will be fucking clean, tins, shaker, like all the bar tools are clean. You're getting everything like wrapped up so you can close, so you can go home, you know, like a normal job, and they'll order like a fucking decaf espresso, like 45 minutes after you close. And that is so fucked up to me. Like, yeah, I'm gonna absolutely make it for you because that's hospitality.

SPEAKER_01 9:55

That's what, like, if you order something, you're gonna get it.

SPEAKER_00 9:59

But like, to not have that wherewithal, to not have that empathy for your fellow service industry worker is so mind-boggling to me that that's the part that we actually lost. We lost the connection to each other during whatever transition this is. Like I said, if you want to say it's COVID, sure, say it's COVID. But we we lost that, and now we're all just like pieces of shit. And we're exactly what we all didn't want to be. We're exactly who we don't want to be. We have like we have guests that come in and they do this all the time, and then we complain about it. Like these new service industry workers will complain about guests and then turn around, go into another restaurant, do the same fucking thing. We can't do that. We can't do that as a restaurant society, as a fucking family, as a bonded community.

SPEAKER_01 10:59

We can't be those people anymore. Anyway, that was my little rant about that.

SPEAKER_00 11:08

Um, let me shift it back over to sobriety. I think that I think it might be a little easier to be sober in this new restaurant dynamic than it used to be. Because it's so fucking stressful anyway, like I say all the time, it's a stressful fucking job. And it made it so much more stressful when we were all just screaming at each other and sexually harassing each other and just like fucking pigs to each other. And I think that that made it, that made shifts a lot longer. Like I remember being sober through a shift and then just being so fucking wound up from not only serving the guests, like having to take care of the guests in the just the, but then also having like the entire kitchen staff mad at you, having the all the servers mad at you, having all the other bartenders mad at you. And then everybody's just pissed off at each other, everyone's like talking shit about each other, everyone's like sexually harassing each other, no one feels comfortable, no one feels safe in their own skin. So you have all that built up. And then after a shift, you know, you're just like, fuck, like I need a fucking drink. I need like I need something to like write this shit because I'm so fucking wound up. And now when I work a shift, it's none of that background shit. It's just the guests, it's just the day in and day out minutiae of restaurants. And I I don't know if I could stay sober back then in that old restaurant style. Like, I don't know if I could do it. I could do it in this restaurant style. I can tell you that. Like, it's it doesn't feel like it's as hard. I mean, granted, like I have a lot more tools and I'm you know, like I know that I want to be sober now, but kudos to anyone who was able to stay sober through, you know, like back then. Like, kudos, fucking great job, great work. You guys are fucking my heroes. Absolutely, you guys are my heroes for being able to stay sober through all that bullshit. I mean, kudos to like everyone who can stay sober in restaurants, honestly, because it's so it's just right there, it's just right in front of you. Everybody goes out afterwards to and that's kind of leads me to another thing. It's like it's so much easier to stay sober in restaurants if you're not hanging out with other people who are in the restaurant. Like, I know I I get it, you know, like having friends is super important, and a lot of people get into working in restaurants so they can make those friends, they can make like-minded friends because people who work in restaurants are kind of like all really similar. Like, we all have really similar personalities. Um, so it it is like it's it's a lot of fun. It's a lot of fun, like, you know, cutting it up for sure. But I learned that I don't need to hang out with anybody that I work with after work for the most part, unless we're going and doing like something else, you know, like catching like a baseball game or something. But like I don't need to, I don't need to fill my time outside of work with people that I work with at like bars. Like, I mean, I could do it, I could go and I could, you know, drink a Diet Coke or something, but like that's not really that's kind of just like a snowball thing. So in order to get sober, stay sober in the restaurant industry, like I I suggest just kind of like you don't have to be a dick to people, right? Like you can still be friendly, you can still be friends at work, you can still you can still be funny as fuck at work, like all that stuff. You like they could want to hang out with you, you could want to hang out with them, but like my suggestion is just like don't. It's just you know, like I said, it's a snowball effect. If you're good for the first few times, and then you start getting like comfortable, and then you know, then it's just next thing you know, you have a drink in your hand, and I don't want to see that for anybody, especially if you know you're trying to get sober and you're trying to stay sober in this industry, because it is so hard, even nowadays. It was harder back then, I think. Um I don't know. I'd have to find a time machine and like go back and redo it as a sober person and just see how I feel. I might it might have actually been better. I mean, like if I wasn't hung over and you know, like with a little drugs in my system or something, like maybe I could have stayed sober. Who knows? I was also young, and I'm a firm believer in the fact that like people are just like dumb when they're young. Like, I was dumb as fuck. I couldn't handle like day-to-day tasks to save my life. Like, I was so fucking daunted by paying rent back then. Like, I was like, oh like I can't be fucking bothered with bills, can't be bothered with just like normal life shit. Like, no, why would I do that? I'm fucking 24. Like, I couldn't figure it out at all. Like going to the post office. I still don't really know how to go to the post office. That's something it's on my list. It's on my list of things to tackle and figure out. Like, go to the post office, go to the DMV, figure out how to go to cell phone stores, like, you know, all this all this little stuff. Um yeah, that's a short one. It's a short one for this week. It's I just really wanted to I just really wanted to touch on this new restaurant, this shift. I think that if you haven't noticed it already, maybe you will notice that there has been a huge shift over the past, you know, eight years. Um I I've noticed it. It's it's been huge. It's been the huge one, like huge 180. And it's like I said, it's for the good, but it's also for the bad, right? Like, I think we need to hold on to the the good part of like not screaming at each other and sexually harassing each other, calling each other fucking idiots to their faces. Like, I think we really need to hold on to that. But I think that we need to get back to having grace if we go out. I think if you work in the restaurant industry, you need to be held accountable. You need to be held to a certain standard that's higher than everyone else's. Like, you're held to a different standard to me if you work in a restaurant automatically. You should know how to go out. You should know how to act when you go out. You're not just one of these Joe Schmoes off the street fucking finance bro. You're not a fucking, you're not an Instagram influencer coming off the street asking for rose with a bunch of ice and a fucking spice of jalapeno in it. Like, no. We should know better, we should act better, we should treat each other better. And that is like we should all fucking, we everyone should listen to this. Everyone should push this on each other if you work in restaurants. This is the only way we're gonna get better. This is the only way you become a better person, is if you know how to act in a restaurant. I mean, I say that even if you don't work in a restaurant, like you should know how to act in a restaurant, you should know how to act when you go out. You don't snap your fingers, you don't say, hey, hey, hey, you don't ask for ridiculous shit, you don't really complain. I mean, like if you're ordering a fucking you know $300 steak or something and it is overcooked, like, yeah, but there is like a there's a way to complain.

SPEAKER_01 19:11

Like there's a way to bring it up. You don't get all fucking pissed off. Like, you just don't get pissed off.

SPEAKER_00 19:16

We don't come to your fucking job. You're a fucking grocery store manager. We don't come to your job and just start throwing lettuce around because it's, you know, a little brown. We don't start freaking the fuck out because shit isn't lined up on your shelves. Like, that's just not how stuff operates. We're all humans. Everyone is a fucking human being in a restaurant. Sometimes shit gets fucked up. That's just gonna happen. It's gonna happen. I'm so sorry that it happened to you. So, so fucking sorry that it happened to you.

SPEAKER_01 19:47

Let us fucking fix it for you without you freaking the fucking out or getting all pissed or leaving a bad fucking review. Like, have some grace, right? Same thing like going in to eat before, like right before the kitchen closes, going and getting drinks right before the bar closes. Stop doing that. We don't you're a fucking you're a fucking loan officer, right?

SPEAKER_00 20:16

Like you're a loan officer, you work at a bank, you close at five. I'm not coming in at 459 asking you to draw me up loan paperwork. No, you would tell me to, you would like show me the fucking door. And I'd have to like everyone's like, yeah, no, absolutely, we get that. But if people say no to you when you come in five minutes before a kitchen closes asking for a well-done tomahawk, like, and then you get so fucking mad when people are like, actually, no, like the kitchen's closing, and you're like, oh, this is this is your fucking job. How can you fucking do this? You're the problem, you're the problem. Absolutely. I'll say it out loud.

SPEAKER_01 20:56

I'll tell you you're the problem to your fucking face. Everyone needs to stop doing this. Stop doing this. If you're trying to get sober, get sober, stay sober.

SPEAKER_00 21:08

You're doing a great job. We all need to band together. We all need to give each other grace. We all need to be better people.

SPEAKER_01 21:17

Also, give yourself some fucking grace. Especially if you're trying to get sober.

SPEAKER_00 21:24

Give yourself some fucking grace. You're doing a great job. Wanting to get sober is one of the hardest things you could possibly decide in your entire life. To be like, I don't want to do this thing that everybody else is doing, and society pushes it on me so fucking much. Like, I don't want to do it anymore. That's a fucking huge step. That's monumental. You need to give yourself a round of applause just for fucking thinking that. And then if you're doing the damn thing, like, fuck yeah, good for you. Like, seriously, good for you. Like, not a congratulations. I fucking hate when people tell Me, congratulations for being sober. Like, congratulations on what? Congratulations is like a happy birthday. Congratulations. You got another year older. That's just shit that happens. Like, you don't say congratulations to someone who just worked so fucking hard. You say great fucking work. So great fucking work to everyone who's even listening to this, who's deciding any of this at all, even if you're not like great fucking work on something. You're probably doing something fucking great. And you need to be applauded for that shit. So I'm gonna leave you on that. Great fucking work. Go out and get them. Fucking get this shit. Be better people. Have more empathy. Don't go to restaurants right before they close.