I’ve worked in a restaurant before, but not on the management side. When there are a lot of people waiting to be seated and quite a few open tables why not sit them down and at least them order some drinks and start making money?
From a customer’s perspective this always comes across poorly.
Is it a simple matter of not staffing enough people?
After taking a look at you, they probably hoped that you'd decide to go somewhere else if they made you wait, you running-shoes-with-a-suit scrub.
You've obviously never worked in a restaurant. Open tables are kept that way so the kitchen doesn't get overwhelmed.
Need to keep tables open so if a celebrity or big shot customer comes in without a reservation they can be seated right away.
Some restaurants have rules of maximum number of tables per waiter so that the service is always good.
If there aren’t enough waiters that day to wait on all the tables in the restaurant, some will be kept empty.
So it’s either a staffing issue or the kitchen isn’t big enough for the restaurant.
Senator Clay Davis wrote:
You've obviously never worked in a restaurant. Open tables are kept that way so the kitchen doesn't get overwhelmed.
DietBacon wrote:
Some restaurants have rules of maximum number of tables per waiter so that the service is always good.
If there aren’t enough waiters that day to wait on all the tables in the restaurant, some will be kept empty.
If there are people waiting to be seated when there are empty tables, to them the service is automatically not good.
Annoyed and hangry wrote:
Is it a simple matter of not staffing enough people?
One of the dumbest questions I've read on here. If this is a troll post, I say 9/10.
OK then, how about this? wrote:
DietBacon wrote:
Some restaurants have rules of maximum number of tables per waiter so that the service is always good.
If there aren’t enough waiters that day to wait on all the tables in the restaurant, some will be kept empty.
If there are people waiting to be seated when there are empty tables, to them the service is automatically not good.
^^Ding!
If you walk into a restaurant and there's a big queue or the hostess lets you know there's a 30 min waiting period, you know you're gonna be there waiting a long time.
But you're never expecting to have to wait very long for drinks when you sit down, or for the waiter to come take your order, or for your food to be getting cold when you receive it cause the waiter's been too busy to take it to you right away, etc.
DietBacon wrote:
If you walk into a restaurant and there's a big queue or the hostess lets you know there's a 30 min waiting period, you know you're gonna be there waiting a long time.
But you're never expecting to have to wait very long for drinks when you sit down, or for the waiter to come take your order, or for your food to be getting cold when you receive it cause the waiter's been too busy to take it to you right away, etc.
Also, in the first scenario only the people waiting to be seated while there are empty tables is upset. In the second scenario, everyone is upset.
Annoyed and hangry wrote:
I’ve worked in a restaurant before, but not on the management side. When there are a lot of people waiting to be seated and quite a few open tables why not sit them down and at least them order some drinks and start making money?
From a customer’s perspective this always comes across poorly.
Is it a simple matter of not staffing enough people?
Staffing restaurants has to be a nightmare. While I am sure some have good data, I bet a lot do not (or do not look at it) and miss. Plus with the economy going pretty well I wonder if it is harder to find waitstaff.
Seinfeld 4!
Luv2Run wrote:
Annoyed and hangry wrote:
I’ve worked in a restaurant before, but not on the management side. When there are a lot of people waiting to be seated and quite a few open tables why not sit them down and at least them order some drinks and start making money?
From a customer’s perspective this always comes across poorly.
Is it a simple matter of not staffing enough people?
Staffing restaurants has to be a nightmare. While I am sure some have good data, I bet a lot do not (or do not look at it) and miss. Plus with the economy going pretty well I wonder if it is harder to find waitstaff.
I obviously can’t speak for all restaurants, but the restaurant that I worked in throughout college (08-12) relied heavily on data. They were startling accurate when it came to predicting business on a given night.
The manager used to print a report which showed sales for that given business week dating all the way back to ‘96 when the restaurant first opened. Starting in 2000 or so, the report also has notes such as: “the Rascall flatts concert across town brought in a large crowd” or “first Home football game for the local college amped up the lunch rush”. The manager would then look over this info and staff accordingly. As a stats guy, I always appreciated this.
Now to the actual topic - your question has been answered beautifully. Either kitchen staff or wait staff can’t keep up if you see empty tables AND a line up of waiting guests. No matter how well managers plan, this is sometimes unavoidable. If it is a common occurrence at a particular place, that manager needs to get his act together.
Cartwright wrote:
Seinfeld 4!
Yeah, yeah. I tell her you not here, she said curse word, I hang up!
Something else that comes up, not mentioned above, is that sometimes parties will have made reservations for a certain time. Let's say a restaurant has 20 tables, 15 are in use and 5 appear to be open. 25% open tables could look like "lots of open tables" in some places. You come in for dinner at 6:15pm, see 5 open tables. But let's say all 5 of those are on reservation for between 6:30 and 6:45.
I don't own a restaurant or work directly in one, but one of my side jobs I work the front counter at a bowling center. We get this same question all the time this time of year from people who come in looking for a lane. We have 36 lanes. If you come in after work at 5:15 on any given Tues, Weds, Thurs, Fri this time of year it's going to look like we have 25-30 open lanes. But we have leagues that start at 5:45 that use those lanes so maybe I can only put you on the wait list. Or Saturday/Sunday afternoons, people will come in and see 8-10-12+ lanes not being used but we have a party or parties coming in within the hour that are going to use those lanes. People are usually pretty good about staying patient but probably every other week somebody will get all twisted up about the wait.
not a server wrote:
Something else that comes up, not mentioned above, is that sometimes parties will have made reservations for a certain time. Let's say a restaurant has 20 tables, 15 are in use and 5 appear to be open. 25% open tables could look like "lots of open tables" in some places. You come in for dinner at 6:15pm, see 5 open tables. But let's say all 5 of those are on reservation for between 6:30 and 6:45.
I don't own a restaurant or work directly in one, but one of my side jobs I work the front counter at a bowling center. We get this same question all the time this time of year from people who come in looking for a lane. We have 36 lanes. If you come in after work at 5:15 on any given Tues, Weds, Thurs, Fri this time of year it's going to look like we have 25-30 open lanes. But we have leagues that start at 5:45 that use those lanes so maybe I can only put you on the wait list. Or Saturday/Sunday afternoons, people will come in and see 8-10-12+ lanes not being used but we have a party or parties coming in within the hour that are going to use those lanes. People are usually pretty good about staying patient but probably every other week somebody will get all twisted up about the wait.
do you have 15 lb balls?
This is correct. It's about good service once you're seated. Customer expectations are different between waiting for the host ("Ok, there's a wait, I can be patient with that 30 min estimate) vs being seated ("Why does it take 10 minutes to get a drink order"??)
DietBacon wrote:
If you walk into a restaurant and there's a big queue or the hostess lets you know there's a 30 min waiting period, you know you're gonna be there waiting a long time.
But you're never expecting to have to wait very long for drinks when you sit down, or for the waiter to come take your order, or for your food to be getting cold when you receive it cause the waiter's been too busy to take it to you right away, etc.
Le Grande Orange wrote:
Cartwright wrote:
Seinfeld 4!
Yeah, yeah. I tell her you not here, she said curse word, I hang up!
You walk to a table and sit down. You don't say anything and I'll give you fifty bucks!
Tables are kept open for people with reservations.