Archive for July, 2006

Still think you don’t need to utilize a blog to talk to your guests?

The ever-expanding blogosphere still qualifies as the Wild West of the Internet. But at least one weblog-savvy operator has used the online medium to get his new restaurant off to a flying start, attracting everything from a crowd of paying customers on day one to extensive coverage by mainstream media outlets soon thereafter. The total dollar outlay for the publicity blitz that made a hit of blogger Jim Reams’ new Mothership BBQ in Nashville? Zero.Read More

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Blame it on Chipotle!

Remember when rapid growth in the fast casual segment was thought to come primarily at the expense of quick-service restaurants? No more. In the current economic environment, a value proposition that combines casual-restaurant-quality food with near-QSR pricing points seems to be convincing many patrons to forego the full-blown casual dining experience and opt for a fast-casual meal instead. Need evidence? Check out the numbers the leading casual dining chains have put up so far this year.Read More

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Do you want kid’s in your restaurant?

The number one item posted on the last 4 surveys I have read about bad service is - not surprising to me! - rude behavior of children in the dining room! And I agree! This is even noted above and before rude service from an employee!

I think the day is coming - and not to soon for me - that restaurateurs will begin to find ways to crack down on rude behavior from children. Would you allow that kind of behavior from adults? Not in the least. So why tolerate it from children?

I always coach clients that you make more money from adults who wish to visit you because you do not allow insensitive behavior from the children of obtuse parents. Unless of course you are Chuck E Cheese or a business that is geared toward children. It’s sort of along the lines of the arguments against going smokeless. And once we make the transformation, we will all kick ourselves at not having done it sooner!

Read this writer’s experience! Sound familiar?

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Better than they deserve?

Seth Godin

At eight o’clock tonight, the best restaurant in Grand Cayman was deserted. Just two diners, chowing down on an astonishing whole red snapper, caught several hours before by a local fisherman.

Jindi, the owner of the Thai Restaurant in Georgetown, explained to me that they’ve been there for fifteen years and lunch pays the rent. “Every day, lunch is very busy… it’s the cruise ships,” she explained.

Imagining a stream of classic cruise ship turistas invading her restaurant every day made me shudder. The restaurant does well at lunch because it has the perfect location for cruise ships (three blocks from the dock–exactly far enough way to seem exotic). Then I looked over the restaurant and realized that for more than a decade, Jindi has refused to compromise her standards. There are dozens of dishes that would disappear if she was only catering to the lunch crowd. Do the bulk of her customers care about her home-grown thai basil and lime leaves? There are preparations and ingredients that cost her a fortune, and it’s clear why she’s doing it. Not for the bulk of her customers, but for herself, for her staff and for the chowhounds she encounters at random.

Jindi’s refusal to compromise is yet another reason she’s doing so well at lunch, actually. Because taste is starting to catch up with her. People are now ordering the items she would have deleted ten years ago.

And in a connected world, it’s much easier for the chowhounds to leave a digital trail of breadcrumbs to her door.

Letting your customers set your standards is a dangerous game, because the race to the bottom is pretty easy to win. Setting your own standards–and living up to them–is a better way to profit. Not to mention a better way to make your day worth all the effort you put into it.

Source: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2006/07/better_than_the.html

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More States Boost Minimum Wage

Lawmakers in North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Delaware have recently approved increases to their state’s minimum wage.

In North Carolina, the minimum wage will increase from $5.15 per hour to $6.15 per hour effective January 1, 2007. The new minimum wage law also ties North Carolina ’s minimum wage to the federal Fair Labor Standards Act. If the federal minimum wage is raised, employees in North Carolina will receive whichever wage is higher.

In Pennsylvania, the minimum wage will increase from $5.15 per hour to $6.25 per hour on January 1, 2007, and to $7.15 on July 1, 2007. For employers with the equivalent of 10 or fewer full-time employees (based on a 40-hour workweek), the minimum wage will increase in three steps: $5.65 on January 1, 2007; $6.65 on July 1, 2007; and $7.15 on July 1, 2008.

In Delaware, the state minimum wage will increase from $6.15 per hour to $6.65 per hour on January 1, 2007, and to $7.15 per hour on January 1, 2008.

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New Program Aims to Help Employers Comply with Immigration Law

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has launched a new initiative to help employers ensure that they are hiring and employing a workforce that is authorized to work in the United States.

Read more here!

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Speak of the devil!

Not sure if you receive the IRS E-newsletter “Newswire” or not (you should and it’s free!) but this is what was announced Friday.

IRS Announces New Tip Reporting Program

IR-2006-118, July 28, 2006

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service today released formal guidance on its new tip reporting procedure, the Attributed Tip Income Program (ATIP) ATIP expands the existing IRS tip reporting and education program by offering employers in the food and beverage industry an additional tip reporting program. ATIP reduces industry recordkeeping burdens, has simple enrollment requirements and promotes reporting tips on Federal income tax returns.

ATIP provides benefits to employers and employees similar to those offered under previous tip reporting agreements. However, ATIP does not require employers to meet with the IRS to determine tip rates or eligibility. Employers are not required to sign an agreement with the IRS to participate. Like other tip reporting programs, participation by employers and their employees is voluntary.

Employers who participate in ATIP report the tip income of employees based on a formula that uses a percentage of gross receipts, which are generally attributed among employees based on the practices of the restaurant.
Employers receive significant benefits by participating in ATIP:
•The IRS will not initiate an “employer-only” 3121(q) examination during the period the employer participates in ATIP.
•Tip reporting is simplified and in many cases employers will not have to receive and process tip records from participating employees.
•Enrollment is simple. There are no one-on-one meetings with the IRS and no agreements to sign. Employers elect participation in ATIP by checking the designated box on Form 8027, Employer’s Annual Information Return of Tip Income and Allocated Tips.
Employees also benefit from ATIP:

Participating employees do not have to keep a daily tip log or other tip records.
•The IRS will not initiate a tip examination during the period the employer and employee participate in ATIP.
•The improved income reporting procedures could help employees qualify for loans or other financing.
•Employees who work for a participating employer can easily elect to participate in ATIP by signing an agreement with their employer to have their tip income computed under the program and reported as wages.

Some general requirements for participating restaurants:
•The employer annually elects to participate in ATIP and uses the prescribed methodology for reporting tips by filing Form 8027 and checks the ATIP participation box. Simplified filing is provided for small establishments not required to file Form 8027.
•Employer’s establishment must have at least 20% of gross receipts as charged receipts that reflect a charged tip.
•At least 75% of tipped employees must agree to participate in the program.
•Employer reports attributed tips on Employees’ Forms W-2 and pays taxes using the formula tip rate
•The formula tip rate is the charged tip rate minus two percent – the two percent takes into account a lower cash tip rate.
•The charged tip rate is based on information from the establishment’s Form 8027.

ATIP is a three-year pilot program for food and beverage employers. Employers will participate on an annual basis. The first annual basis begins January 1, 2007.

Details and requirements for participation for employers and employees are available here at
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-drop/rp-06-30.pdf

You can subscribe to Newswire by going here
http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/content/0,,id=105771,00.html

Have Fun Today!
Jeffrey Summers
Jeffrey@GetGame.Biz

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Steak house may be liable for $2.5m - Waitresses win suit after losing their tip money and jobs

By Diane E. Lewis, Globe Staff | July 27, 2006

Hilltop Steak House in Saugus could be required to pay more than $2.5 million in damages to wait staff after an Essex County jury found that the restaurant’s function department illegally steered tip money to managers.

The Essex Superior Court jury that returned the verdict late Tuesday also found that the restaurant wrongfully fired four waitresses because they complained about losing a percentage of their tips.

The case, the first of 19 so-called “tip cases” to go to trial in the state, was filed after the Legislature amended Massachusetts law four years ago to say that waitresses, waiters, and bartenders are not legally required to share tips with managers or kitchen staff.

The Massachusetts tip law requires that all proceeds from tips, gratuities, and service charges that are added to bills after customers are served must be distributed to wait staff. The law bars restaurant owners from distributing the money to other employees, including managers, even if they also serve food and beverages.

“These waitresses made $3.60 per hour plus a gratuity,” said Boston lawyer Shannon Liss-Riordan, who represented the Hilltop wait staff. “But the managers who were getting their money were making several hundred dollars per week.” She said that, in some cases, the waitresses received 14 percent of the 18 percent gratuity, with the remainder going to managers.

Boston lawyer John Coyne , who represented the restaurant, declined to comment.

The jury awarded $125,000 to each of three plaintiffs, and $75,000 to a fourth. The jury also found that harm suffered by the waitresses as a result of the restaurant’s violation of the tip law and its decision to fire them merited tripling of $610,000 in damages. Of that, $160,000 will be shared by 42 members of a class certified by the court. With the addition of attorneys’ fees and interest, the final judgment is expected to increase beyond $2.5 million, said Liss-Riordan.

Janet Calcagno , 45, of Saugus said yesterday that she worked at the restaurant for five years and did not know that she was earning tips because the company did not allow wait staff to see the final bill.

“Normally, management would present the bills to the customers and wait staff was not allowed to see a bill,” she said. “Then, one day one of us saw the bill and noticed that they were charging 18 percent to the customers, but we were not getting all of the gratuity.”

In January 2003, a month after four waitresses complained, they were fired . They are identified in court papers as Calcagno ; Joan Rossi , 51, of Saugus; Sunok Gatchell of Revere; and Chong O’Connell, 45, of Everett.

During the trial, Hilltop Restaurant said its managers were entitled to tips because they regularly served food and beverages.

A dozen lawsuits over tips are still pending in the state, including cases that were filed against the Four Seasons, Gillette Stadium, the Weston Golf Club, Top of the Hub, Grill 23 & Bar, The Federalist, and Northeastern University. Seven other cases, including one involving room service at the Four Seasons and eating establishments at the Ritz-Carlton and Boston Harbor Hotel, have been settled.

Restaurants across the country are facing similar lawsuits. In June, a lawsuit filed in California on behalf of some 100,000 Starbucks counter staff was granted class-action status by a superior court judge. The suit alleges that the workers were forced to share their tips with supervisors in violation of wage laws. In New York, meanwhile, the state attorney general three years ago began cracking down on attempts to compensate wait staff only with tips. New York labor laws mandate a minimum wage of $3.30 per hour for all wait staff regardless of the amount of tips earned.

Have Fun Today!
Jeffrey Summers
Jeffrey@GetGame.Biz

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Strategic Management - Promises, Lies and Apologies: Is It Possible to Restore Trust?

In the workplace, trust is essential to day-to-day business, whether it’s one colleague trusting that another will do her share of a project, an employee trusting that his boss will reward him for working long hours to meet a deadline, or a customer trusting that a company will fill an order correctly and deliver it on time. The intertwining issues of trust, deception, apologies and promises are explored in a new research paper titled, “Promises and Lies: Restoring Violated Trust,” by three Wharton professors who came up with a unique laboratory experiment to see what happens when trust breaks down. “While deception may be tempting because it can be used to increase short-term profits for the deceiver,” the researchers note, “we find that the long-term costs of deception are very high.”

Read article here! http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/1532.cfm

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Anheuser-Busch Combines Viral, Event Marketing in Bud Light Promo

Promo Magazine

Beer marketer Anheuser-Busch is taking event sponsorship for its Bud Light brand to a new level, incorporating viral marketing into the mix. In the Chicago area, the company is sponsoring a wide range of events, such as food fairs, block parties and music festivals. At each, the company sends teams of field reps to roam the grounds, taking photos and making videos of consumers. The same day the photos and mini-films are taken, they are e-mailed to the subjects, after being ornamented with Bud Light branding. The campaign’s goal is to get consumers to pass along the photos and the 10- to 15-second videos to friends and family. A viral link, as well as a link to A-B, is embedded in the e-mail. And it’s working. The promotion began earlier this month and more than 250 photos or videos were shot at each event. Each recipient is e-mailing the images on to an average three friends, says Jeff Frumin, founder and CEO of Universal Consulting Group, which handles the campaign

Read the whole story…

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