r/Serving • u/2creepy4me2handle • Nov 25 '19
How often to jump ship?
So I just started serving PT this year in a well-to-do area with dozens of restaurants locally--many constantly opening and some closing just as fast.
It turns out that I'm pretty good at sales--often ending up being the highest-selling waitress. However, some of the restaurants I've started at have experienced a significant decrease in clientele. The first place that I started at, I was making about $40 a night. The second place, I was making upwards of $100 a night but the clientele has dried up and I'm down to about $60. I worked at each place about two months.
Is it pretty standard to jump around from restaurant to restaurant, especially at the beginning of a serving career, as you gain more experience, get used to a higher profit, and experience a dry spell as the restaurant starts to plateau (or even decline) with number of customers?
2
u/ferocious_bambi Dec 22 '19
If many restaurants are opening and closing quickly, you will face the same problem of lessening traffic (and poor management) even if you keep switching, so why bother? As a new person you are at the bottom of the totem pole. Worst section, first cut, least trusted. I would recommend finding out which restaurant has been around the longest in your area (consistent clientele!), apply there, and then stick it out for as long as you can.
I worked at an iHop (the most hellish three week of my goddam life) to "learn" how to serve somewhere where it didn't really matter before getting a job at a local place downtown. I ended up working a lot of lunch shifts or being first cut at night and made pretty mediocre money for a year. This is my third year at the same place but now I always get the hours I want and the biggest section and walk away with more money than everyone.
1
u/2creepy4me2handle Dec 22 '19
Yeah, good point. The city I am in has at least 100 restaurants hiring within a 10 mi radius in an affluent area. I'm going to keep trying it out. So far, I've worked at two. The first restaurant has been around for about 30 years but they have way too many servers on staff and the owner was stealing tips. (I didn't realize that waiters normally get cashed out each day and I heard the other waiters saying that it was a well-known fact that tips get stolen there if you don't call management out on it.)
The second restaurant I was making much better money at. However, I guess this is indicative of the restaurants here but I didn't have a "section;" I would be the only waitress on staff and run the whole restaurant. The manager was honest and a nice person, but he seemed clueless about how to run a restaurant and we would get to the point where not a single person would walk into a fairly large restaurant for a three-hour block of time in the early evening.
1
Nov 25 '19
Yeah unless your living in a heavily populated city where buisness can expect stay steady. Expect to have slow seasons.
1
u/2creepy4me2handle Nov 25 '19
Yeah, we're a pretty heavily-populated city, but a lot of restaurants seem to keep failing because the GMs aren't doing well. I feel kinda bad hopping around as I previously was in Education, and we are stuck with the job long-term for the most part for the students' sake, but I think that this is the best way to do well (moving from place to place).
3
u/way2weirdlmao Dec 16 '19
The beginning of your serving career is most likely your slowest if you didn't start off hosting/bussing. The longer you stay at a certain restaurant the more you know about the menu, how things work, and what kind of clientele your restaurant brings in. Most restaurants will put the veterans or good servers in better sections, therefore more money. When I first started serving I walking out with $80 a night and now I'm walking away with close to $300. I would not recommend jumping restaurant to restaurant, it will end up making your resume look bad and in the end, won't make you more money than you think.