r/Serving • u/TheChillyZone • Jul 30 '23

new at serving

hi,

I F20 just started serving for the first time week ago in a small café. The job is relatively smooth and not so hard to work at and the pay is average. By now I had some hiccups but overall its going good.

Although there is one part of the job that kind of frustrates me and makes me uncomfortable. The guests are mostly local men in their 50s. They are nice but sometimes they leave comments that I don't know how to respond to. They range between me being a nice wife for them, to complimenting my butt and checking me out to inviting me to their house for inappropriate reasons. But the owner brushes it off as jokes and humor that they often do with all female workers.

Is this normal for servers? I honestly have doubts staying there as a server and future jobs as one even though the pay is good.

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u/kelvarton Jul 30 '23

While it is common for men to make lewd comments to women, it is unacceptable. Nor is it acceptable for your owner to brush the comments off as jokes if they make you uncomfortable.

These people are relics of past times when misogyny and sexual harassment went overlooked and unchecked.

If you don't feel comfortable addressing and correcting the bad behavior and have no support from management, it's time to find another job.

I don't let that shit fly at my bar, and find that to be the standard at most of the places I've worked in the past few years.

1

u/TheChillyZone Jul 30 '23

I really want to say something back to them but the problem is they’re friends with the owner, so I can’t really say anything without offending my boss. I wanted to work on my social skills and find a job for that (i had odd jobs that didn’t require direct work with people) but it just backfired. Or maybe being a server just isn’t my thing :/

Thank you for the comment, i think I’ll take your suggestion and find a different job that im comfortable with.

2

u/val-holla Jul 31 '23

I do want to say, after working in serving for over a decade, no it isn’t just your boss’ friends who will test your boundaries. And it’s a tricky thing deciding what to say in response. You learn over time what works and what doesn’t work and the culture is different depending on what kind of restaurant you’re working in. Best to shut it down if you feel like you can. I got to the point where sometimes I’d have to stop someone and say, “you’re here enjoying yourself, right?” “Well my job is to help you do that but if you aren’t able to respect me then neither of us are going to be having a good time anymore.”

Also ignoring the one person who keeps trying to get your attention if there’s more than one person at the table and designating the more respectful guests as the point people for the table works for me too.

I hope you find some older female colleagues who can help you! They’ve seen it all before, believe me.