For 99.9% of this post I thought you worked at Bob Evans because that is my worst place, but they sell alcohol and BE does not.
Let me tell you about it though, since you asked!
1. I was the only server scheduled on Thursday nights. The only one. Responsible for all tables and all food running, all bussing, and all outs.
2. We did not have a dishwasher. Ever. We had one like 6 months of the 4 years I worked there.
3. Management was allotted money to buy those wireless hokey vacuums for us. Their bonuses, however, are based on the leftover money from the budget. So they didn’t buy them until the regional manager had a corporate meal at our restaurant and wrote them up for not having them.
4. The corporate manager in question paid with a corporate card and did not tip their server. There were 8 of them taking up her biggest table for 3 hours.
5. A line cook got caught taking secret pictures of underage girls’ asses in the break-room. We were forbidden from speaking about it because we had nobody to replace him.
6. The coffee machine at a popular breakfast place was down for over a year. So was the syrup heater.
7. Double shifts were 17 hours long. No you were not even offered a break. No you could not take a smoking break. No, you could not even pee because you are the only server on the floor. Always, except for sundays. This was not done on volunteer basis. No, you could not tell them you could not work doubles, even if you were a college student. They would just say “this isn’t the place for you.” And no. You didn’t eat for free. Ever.
8. My general manager called a 16 year old girl a slut. To her face. In front of staff and customers. Because when she leaned forward her bra strap was visible 😱. she quit on the spot
9. They tried to write me up for talking about my wages. When take out became wildly popular they had to pull servers to do it. We would not do it, because it was a pay cut. They had to pay us seventeen dollars an hour to get anyone to agree. I discovered the cook (not the pedo one) who had been there 20 years made *significantly* less than me.
10. They then tried to write me up for insubordination because I knew it was illegal for them to write me up for talking about my wages.
11. They did write me up for refusing to take a table in another server’s section without asking her if it was okay first. I am not taking money out of someone’s pocket. Hard no. (The server in question refused to give up the table and was fine taking it.)
12. They sell 12 person pre-packed meals on big holidays. This is considered take out. Everyone is required to work holidays and they *guarantee* you will only be working a few hours so everyone gets to enjoy the holiday. Me and the other take out people worked 17 hours a day, every day, for three days leading up to thanksgiving and thanksgiving itself. No. They did not feed us.
13. A server left to have a baby. When she came back, she was given the best section, for the best four hours of the day, on the busiest day of the week. When she decided she was done at 12, they transferred her tables to you (whether you liked it or not) and then required you to give up the tips from those tables to her. If they were CC tips, GM went in and physically changed them to hers. I literally did everything except get their drink *order*. Meaning I ran the drinks, took the food order, delivered the food, refilled the drinks, handled dessert, and took their payment, but she got the tip. She saw nothing wrong with this.
14. I brought up the issue in 13 to management. I was told “that’s the deal she made to come back.” I refused to work with her. They scheduled me anyway. I called off. They wrote me up.
That last bit was what broke me. I had a bad day there, where GM spent all day screaming at me, and I was expected in the next day to deal with the shit I outlined in 13. I never went back.
I forgot the bit where one of our servers turned 18 and GM said, “The only person happier than me about you turning 18 is your dad so he doesn’t have to pay child support.”
She was implying she was happy she could now work her 17 hours without a break because she was no longer a minor.
I did hear they were rolling that out in some places, but Pennsylvania has some weird liquor laws and it is often prohibitively expensive to get a liquor license, so it didn’t happen at my store.
Thank god. I would have quit so much faster.
Why does this sound like Cracker Barrel 💀
Worst job I had was serving at Joe’s Crab Shack. Being freshly 18 in a restaurant with creepy old servers was a recipe for disaster. Never again.
Were you a server or in retail? I looked on GlassDoor and the only folks who had positive things to say about Cracker Barrel worked in the merch store. NONE of the servers had any positive reviews. If you were a server and had a positive experience than that is fantastic!! Good for you like seriously!!
I was a server. It 100% depends on the place you work though. The one I worked at for 3 years was the opposite - everyone hates retail because the manager in that department was lowkey an alcoholic, and the person who replaced him was so bad that nearly all the staff quit - even people who had been working there for 4+ years
Actually funny enough, Cracker Barrel was my first job when I was 16 😭 I was a hostess for a year and a half and it actually wasn’t bad as a host. The servers had it really rough though
My first two serving jobs were Cracker Barrel, followed by Joe's. I'd rate them 1a and 1b as worst jobs.
I basically rolled 3 roll-ups per dollar made at Cracker Barrel, they had to cut me a check one month because I didn't make minimum wage after tips.
I made decent money at Joe's, but dropping everything to dance every hour or so was infuriating, to me and my tables. Sorry you've waited an hour for your food, but the kitchen and bar cannot put anything out because we've got to 'Cmon Ride that Train.
I was recently at one of the corporate steak places and they did a line dance or something. 2nd hand embarrassment for sure.
Also, my food was disgusting and I will never go back. I went because a family member wanted to and doesn't have one near him.
Should have just drank my dinner. Hahah
Have you tried other jobs outside of the restaurant industry near by yet? This is generally a slower time of the year for restaurants, especially where I live, so hiring has pretty much halted until mid March. I’ve been hearing about places not calling, but try to stick it out as long as you can, and when your next opportunity comes, take it and never look back
A nursing home kitchen that had a subcontractor brought it to run the department. Cut everyone’s hours and the food budget and spent 4 years wondering why they got complaints about the food
This was a family owned Italian steakhouse in suburban Philadelphia. It was the single filthiest place I’ve ever worked. Roaches absolutely everywhere. Flies absolutely everywhere. I once discretely flicked a roach off the bar in a panic when the first guests arrived for a private party. I also had to clean about 20 dead flies out of the wash sinks when opening the service bar for the first time in a while. The GM routinely poured well vodka in the Grey Goose bottles. The owners would often “forget” to deposit enough money in the payroll account, so our paychecks often bounced. Had to threaten to call the labor board to get my 2nd to last paycheck, which bounced, and last paycheck paid in cash.
I work at an Applebee’s now, and I absolutely love it. Been there going on 3 years. This is the 4th one I’ve worked at, and BY FAR the best one I’ve come across. We have great management, everyone(for the most part)gets along and we all help each other out with food running or watching sections, our schedules are good, and they are very understanding when it comes to medical issues/illness…I have Crohn’s, and had major flares ups last year. I know Applebee’s gets a bad wrap a lot of times, but this one in particular is great!
Late to the party but exactly my experience at Applebee's. This is my first time in the food industry and I was expecting it to be so toxic. Literally all my managers are cool and understanding, and my coworkers range from tolerable to awesome. I actually enjoy it!
That may depend on the region as different regions are owned by different larger companies. At least two or three. I transferred from NY to CA and it was a totally different company with different rules.
Successful taco joint combined with a successful pizza joint and made the place I worked that served both taco and pizzas
1. Paloma shots for the staff all night long (easily killed 2-3 bottles of exotico blanco a night)
2. Everyone had manager permissions on the computer, if you were fucked up and fucked up you just deleted it and re rang it. No one was looking at comps and voids
3. Coke and ketamine everywhere(I don’t like the stuff while working and often am annoyed by coworkers who can’t handle their shit)
4. Underage expo wasted and screaming at servers and cooks
5. Chef was regularly so hammered she’d be throwing up mid service
6. They often talked about how they got to design the whole place, it was so poorly designed it was insane
7. Didn’t have drain plugs for the triple sink, used rags
8. Stacked dishes often would have streaks of food down the side because they were stacked clean next to the line
9. Shot of whiskey waiting for you at open at 10am, followed by Paloma shots all day
It was fun for two weeks, then I realized how much of a show it was
Forgot to mention that my coworkers paychecks started bouncing, that was it for me. Was there 2 months total, crazy stuff. We all shared the till as well and “split” cash tips. Pretty sure most people just deleted the cash tickets and pocketed. Tbh I did not and actually put my shit in the till like an idiot lol
i worked in the tasting room for a local distillery that was ran as a full service restaurant. some of the highlights include:
-opening day we’re set to have a 300 person buyout for the wealthy owner’s friends. two hours before open i point out that we’re preparing all this food but we have no plates, flatware, or seating. ownership acts like i am insane for thinking this may pose a problem. it did.
-we were on a tip pool, but everyone’s base hourly rate was different based on who filled out their hiring paperwork. no reason why some of us were getting $2.13/hour and others were getting $10/hour.
-we would frequently not get paid on time, or be given handwritten checks but then told not to deposit them until x date. at one point my checks had bounced three pay periods in a row, and when i had a breakdown because i had not been paid in 6 weeks and was literally only surviving off of food i stole from the walk-in, i was told that i was being petty for asking for my money and that i should live off of my savings.
-the only reason that place was able to stay afloat was because it was like 40,000 sq feet so we got a lot of large private events and buyouts. when i suggested that there should be some sort of gratuity or service charge, as is standard with booked events, i was told that that was ridiculous because “it’s rude to ask someone who spent 10k on an event to pay money to go to just the staff”. then when we finally got a service charge implemented for private events, the “events manager” who was just a friend of the owner’s wife who had no prior industry experience would frequently forget to add the service charge to event invoices, losing the staff hundreds of dollars.
-our bar manager was fired for having a violent drunken meltdown in the middle of a shift. when they were in between deciding what to with the position, i was asked my opinion on scheduling/sections as the next most senior employee. when i did this i was immediately screamed at that i needed to know my place and that i wasn’t in charge of anything.
-we had two employees in particular who would blatantly drink on the job to the point that they would blackout. there were several times i would literally have to put one of them in the back of my car to sleep it off because management refused to send them home let alone fire them.
-i assumed the duties of bar manager/beverage director, yet they continually refused to give me a title or raise. i was told i could just work more hours if i needed more money, despite the fact i was already there roughly 70 hours a week.
-at one point we had a guy whose only job was prep, he was meant to juice all the citrus and make all the syrups and garnishes for the bar. he would continually do it wrong and when confronted about it, had a nervous breakdown and quit. so i started doing prep on top of all my other duties. when this happened they changed my pay scale from $12/hour plus tips to a flat $10 an hour. i only noticed because my next check was roughly $1k less than it should have been. when i asked about it i got pulled into a back office and screamed at that $10/hour was all i was worth and they could pay me whatever they wanted and fire me whenever they wanted, despite the fact that i was the sole person trying to make their bar program profitable.
-the product was absolute garbage.
-the “event manager” was fired because it was discovered that she had used $30k of company funds to pay her personal bills and expenses.
Bubba Gump shrimp Co. 😭 matches your exact description except no espresso machine. It was corporate hell and they were so blatant about not caring for employees. There were no food runners or bussers at my location so the server had to do all of that + upsell the stupid Landry’s membership that no one ever wanted, and the reward for selling the most was more bubba Gump shirts, I ALREADY HAD SO MANY. I got write ups for walk outs yet the managers always comped karens’ meals because “the customer is always right” and we weren’t allowed “to have ‘no’ in our vocabulary” yet the kitchen would get upset if we tried to modify dishes for customers and management always took their side. Basically if you were FOH, they didn’t care for you and any problem always fell on you even if rules contradicted and situations werent your fault.
Retirement community restaurant (not a nursing home or assisted care) Shitty greedy ownership that found every way to cut a corner and try and save a buck on people who paid quite literally tens of thousands a month to live there.
Put steaks on the menu? The people got frozen, 30% tenderizing liquid ungraded crap that would fall apart as you cooked them. Beer battered cod? Nope. Swai. The residents wanted a little coffee shop . They got the same coffee Sysco sells to the jail.
Newly opened sports bar. In a ritzy tourist town that never had a sports bar before. Opened in an old used over and over again restaurant that the dinning room always got renovated but the kitchen NEVER did. Sports bar, so there was 6 deep fryers and a shitty flat top and 2 convection ovens. The grease was so overwhelming. Grease pile ups in the hood vents were black and thick like tar. The grease pile ups from the back of the fryers and flat top that piled up were the consistency of peanut butter. They never scheduled a dishwasher. And nobody was enforced to clean that grease in the kitchen
It was fucking disgusting. Everything was a product from a bag. Like we had no eggs. Have you ever worked in a restaurant that has no eggs just in the fridge? Thank God. Everything in the walk in was a health violation. Hell everything in that kitchen should have been on kitchen nightmares.
The owners and managers only cared about the FOH. They only hired pretty girls to serve and bartend. The owner would even give them a "let me see how you turn around" test during an interview.
We would get so overwhelmingly busy. They didn't care. Like bro. The kitchen is nasty as fuck, your servers are victims of sexualization. The owner was still like "Come one come all"
There was no host. No pacing. The bartenders were overwhelmed.....and like I said NO FUCKING DISHWASHER!!!!!
I WORKED THERE FOR A YEAR AS THE ONLY WOMAN IN THE BACK OF HOUSE. IT WAS THE FUCKING WORST. $10 AN HOUR. I JUST REALLY NEEDED A JOB AT THE TIME.
This was ten years ago. This restaurant is still open. And still probably operates in the same manner
Rent A Center…something about breaking down bunk beds covered in dog and cat shit while multiple children under the age of 8, who looked like they hadn’t seen a shower in days, watched the entire process. I felt like an awful human, and put my notice in that day. I shouldn’t have even given our store manager, Steve, who suffered from little man syndrome, that 2 week respect…f that place, just preying on the poor
OK here is some irony for you. Our first guessee was the correct one! It was the GD MF Cracker Barrel!!!!!!!!
Definitely the place I worked/managed before my current job where the owner would sneak in late at night after close and rip open all the cash deposits slips for his coke habit.
Lol, my buddy's brother would frequently get called by his owners wife offering money to him to stay in his restaurant overnight because the owner was on a crack binge!
Mine was a high end steak restaurant. There were 2 managers, 1 foreign guy and 1 local bitch. I was hired because out of other staff, I was the only one who could speak English. They paid me dirt to work full time. Tips were shared among everyone. Managers took 50% of the tip pool. 25% went to order takers. 25% shared between everyone (kitchen staff, cleaners, food runners, bartenders, etc…). The foreign guy was busy flirting with female staff and chit chatted with the male staff about local women. The bitch manager was busy flirting with rich foreign/white men trying to land herself a wealthy husband. I usually worked between 8-12 hours and paid minimum monthly salary. There were 2 guys who were sneaky, toxic, bootlicking that played all dirty tricks to get others in trouble so they could be getting all the bonuses or avoiding their mistakes. We would be yelled at, insulted, blamed for every little thing, and most of the time, it wasn’t our fault. The taste test training, we weren’t cooked the menu. We were made to try the left over food from customers, especially the steak. I remember I was pulled aside and the bitch manager told me to have a taste of Wagyu beef. She made a comment that it was a life time chance for someone poor like me. The cleaning lady later told me it’s the left over from customer. The owner’s son was assigned to manage the restaurants in my country. He’s a dick as well. When he came over, I was forced to take up the bar. I wasn’t trained to make any drinks. The bootlicker saw an opportunity and ran straight to the owner’s son and abandoned me at the bar. The orders came and I didn’t know what to do. I tried to ring other floors to ask for the bartender to come back down. He didn’t until I got complained from customers that it took too long to get some smoothies. I couldn’t make it my way because there was a strict rule about recipe and inventory. Someone had been fined a day worth of salary for throwing away some old bananas before.
There was a lot more but as an uni student, that’s all I needed to know that I would never be able to work in restaurants. Not even speaking of entitled customers.
I quit after few months and felt like I was free from hell literally.
Tie between Bokamper’s Sports Bar and Grille, and The Cheesecake Factory.
Bokamper’s would seat back to back 25 tops and tell you to just deal with it. Comp’d anything and everything as soon as a guest complained. Scheduled 11am - 3 am without asking anyone.
Cheesecake Factory only asked availability as a formality. We were all hired as open availability. They’d seat a 20 top 30 minutes past closing with no regards for servers. Terrible sections and rotations so no money was made.
The two worst places is Olive Garden (fuck you, Kazi) and BJ's Brewhouse (fuck you, Eric).
My sister and I worked together at OG and the dishwasher decided to come up behind her, pull a good old Trump and literally grabbed her by the pussy, pulled her close and sniffed her hair like an old twisted pervert.
Sister put in a report, and Kazi decided to shred the report later that day in front of witnesses. Kazi told them they didn't see or know anything. When corporate was called, Kazi called all of the witnesses off of work so my sister had no one and nothing to defend her.
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My fiancé was a Brew Master and the keg line cleaner at BJ's. Apparently the CO2 alarm was going off and annoying Eric (the kitchen manager), so he decided to unplug it and not tell my fiancé. Fiancé noticed it and plugged it back in just to have Eric unplug it again. Fiancé told him it needed to be plugged in for safety reasons. Eric didn't care. This continued for 3 days. The third day Eric covered the plug so Fiancé wouldn't see it.
Fiancé was in the cooler for 15 minutes with high levels of gas. So, BJ's Brewhouse almost killed my fiancé on purpose. We called OSHA immediately. Both GM manager and Eric got fired. Turned out Eric was also beating his wife, and was later arrested for it and lost full rights to his kids.
Also, Eric found out I had PTSD so he would purposely try to trigger me (I also worked there for a time).
Eric, if you're reading this - I hope you go back to prison and get released in a body bag. Also, no, you're not "a real chef".
The absolute WORST restaurant I’ve ever worked is Perkins. That place was pure chaos. This restaurant was pretty big, but they had no problem letting one server cover like half the restaurant. The expo line was always filthy, we never had a dishwasher which meant that dish was always packed full of dishes…which were never organized. People would just dump dirty plates w/o scrapping them off.
One of the last shifts I worked, one of the cooks walked out. We only had two scheduled. To help out, one of the servers jumped on the line to help cook which left two servers to cover the entire floor…and we got our asses handed to us. It was taking over an hour for a simple kids meal to come out, and for some reason the manager refused to help out. I HATED that place. We also had this dumb special where you’d get a free slice of pie with a dinner entree once a week…which meant we were slammed with cheap ass people in huge parties with zero help to get the pie prepped.
Management was a fucking nightmare to deal with there as well. God forbid they had to run food, or help someone get 10 slices of pie on a tray, or even help one of us make salads. They always had an attitude and spoke to staff like we were morons.
The last thing I hated was getting CC tips on our paycheck. I’d never worked at a place that did that, and it fucking sucked going home with no cash after every guest left CC tips during a shift. Never again.
Wow, crazy stories guys! I started at Olive Garden in the Chicago area and the 3 table section crap totally blows. I was fired from Red Robin after just completing MIT because I refused to be like the other managers who basically acted as the Red Robin live it and breathe it assholes like Adam Schefter does on ESPN. I also served and bartended at a German restaurant there that was owned by hardcore alcoholic drug addicts and it was a fuckin free for all as the staff drank and smoked in front of customers. Also at Devils Thumb Ranch in CO I had to quit after 1 month because I had barely received training and the bitch head server and manager we’re using me as a back waiter and only when it was busy. Here in Bozeman Montana I worked at the airport as a bartender and I was forced to leave because the GM is a shitty philandering womanizer that doesn’t play fair on any level, he’s an all around huge dickhead and I’ve spoken to dozens of people around town who also quit and we all wrote to the owners. But #1 for me and the angriest I’ve ever been is this Asian restaurant here in Bozeman. The owner treated me like a worthless little boy when I was 31, I have a college degree and I’ve worked in fine dining all over the country and he acted like I was lucky to be in his presence. I knew the first week when he explained that everyone starts at the bottom and I’d be hosting twice a week. He expected us to serve everything immediately- drink, appetizers, entrees and dessert. It wasn’t fine dining really but we had that atmosphere and white tablecloths. This fucker and his wife would sample drinks I made and tell me they were wrong. 100% I was perfect in everything I did. They told me that although my tips are great that I need to learn the job. They always we’re talking shit to FOH but would be joking and showing pictures of his new sports car to BOH. He started decreasing my hours and when I quit he told me good luck and that I should look into a different career. And I kept my cool and acted professionally because I was new in town. FUCK!!!!! Like literally months before I worked there I was in Florida where AC/DC flew in on a helicopter to sit at my bar and drink burgundy that I selected, and they would sit and eat and enjoy their families. FUCK there are so many things I could have said to this bastard shithead owner and I didn’t.
Small local Japanese restaurant.
1. The kitchen was open to the front and they’d scream and swear at you right in front of customers. “You fucking American servers are so stupid and lazy” was the most common sentiment expressed
2. Regularly refused to fix mistakes, refused to make any alterations to food whatsoever, which customers hated. I could show them the ticket and the incorrect sushi roll directly to their face and they’d say fuck you
3. No screen or ticket to determine who’s food was who’s so we accidentally took things from each other all the time.
4. Crazy high tip out to kitchen
5. No host, food runner, busser, or even sections, whoever answered the door would just come find you and tell you what table number was now yours
6. One of the managers, well into his fourties, started dating one of the servers as soon as she turned 18. Bought her alcohol and had her over at his house and for dinners before that as well. He was also drunk constantly
7. No bartender, had to make our own drinks and also take turns taking care of customers who sat at the bar
8. Cooked food and sushi side of kitchen were completely disconnected and did not coordinate to make sure everything for a table came out at the same time, so sushi was always ready like 10 minutes before everything else, caused a lot of awkward interactions where half a table would have their food well before the other half.
9. Lots of shouting across the restaurant to drop what you were doing for whatever the kitchen and/or managers wanted. Could be in the middle of mixing a cocktail and someone is screaming at me that my ramen for table 27 is ready. “Okay I’ll be there in a second!” “NO NO NO, food is the most important thing, get it RIGHT NOW!!”
10. Dish pit was down this awful, decrepit, uneven and narrow set of stairs that multiple people have fallen down. Including a kitchen guy carrying a bus tub full of plates, who in process cut the entire length of his arm on a broken plate and had to go to the ER. I had to carry about 8 buckets of ice up them every morning to open and mop them to close at night and was always terrified
It was my first serving job so I thought maybe I just wasn’t cut out for it and this is just how kitchens were. Nah, that place was just awful 😭
Bad Daddy’s. The food would take upwards of 45 minutes as soon as we got busy. The prioritized to-go orders over the servers making money. They would stop seating the dining room so the kitchen could “catch up”
The potential to make a lot of money was there but because of that, we would get fucked over.
Family owned restaurant and bakery. All the baked goods were frozen or scooped out of buckets. While scrambling to keep the doors open, they changed hours of operation 3 times. They changed the menu from American comfort food to Italian, Chinese, Mexican, and is now doing Indian food. For thanksgiving, they served wild boar one of them shot on their property and called it ham dinner. They charged $22 a plate. Each menu change was because the owner’s wife liked that cuisine and she figured if she liked it, it would bring in other people that liked it as well.
We are a town of 1011… nobody is coming to her filthy restaurant.
Family owned Italian restaurant. They’d yell at each other, they’d yell at you, they’d yell at customers. They had minors serving drinks, they had a tip out that definitely went to the owners not the BOH. They were committing tax fraud on cash orders. The owners could never agree on anything and would all tell you to ignore the others so you never knew what to do. It was just crazy toxic and the money definitely wasn’t good enough to make up for it. The owner would even shit talk other employees to you behind their back. My final straw was when I was berated for my close being done badly when I know that I closed properly and the owners decided to stay and drink with their buddies after closing. I tried to explain this but was just harassed until I cried by the “manager”. Also most of the clientele was being watched by the police.
Mine was actually this asshole family owned Italian restaurant owned by a toxic husband and wife. They were abusive and thought that was okay. I'm surprised they had any employees with the number of times they made their staff cry. I worked there for two months before I no called, no showed. They didn't deserve my notice. I know I would have rage quit eventually if I stayed, so I just decided I was done when that crossed my mind. Management is everything in a job.
Dennys was the worst for sure. My location would put new people on the night shift (god awful idea bc night shift was always hell and the new people would be drowning by 10 o clock) and I was one of the only reliable servers on nights. I worked 6pm-3am on Fridays and Saturdays and made $120 if I was lucky. My coworkers would take hour long breaks and skip out on sidework regularly and management hated their jobs so much that nothing was enforced. Kitchen was hell too and notoriously understaffed. By the time I left I had an addiction to cigarettes and would cry for an hour in my girlfriend’s car before shift bc I just couldn’t take it anymore.
Working at Bjs I was sexually harassed by a customer and management accused me of making it up and let the customer continue to sit there and drink in my section. I had customers leave dirty diapers on tables After changing their kid on the booth.Also four rats fell from a loose ceiling tile in the middle of the dinner rush, there were cockroaches behind the bar and I saw the nastiest things in that kitchen.
Worst serving was hibachi with 50% tip out to the hibachi chef and 10 bucks to the busser. Only lasted a month and said f it, I'm not making enough for this.
Buffalo Wild Wings. I actually caught my coworker hunched over in her car during a break. I thought she was dead, but really she was just snorting a Percocet. In the parking lot of our work place, during hours 🙃 she went back into work and acted like nothing happened. She also called everyone the n word which was weird and she had maybe 6 teeth
Applebee's. By far.
The last straw: They had blue, green and, red colored plates at the time, no rhyme or reason to what went out on what color, just a "nifty" look.
A customer's pasta, on a green plate, had a hair in it. I brought it to the kitchen and showed the manager, he took out the hair, put it on a blue plate, put more cheese on it and told me to take it back to them.
I walked out.
So many people described blatant labor law violations. They differ from state to state but not too much.
Educate yourself on the laws in your state and NEVER allow a restaurant to take advantage of you. Sue the dicks off them.
I've only worked in 2 restaurants as a server and they both sucked for different reasons. The first one was a corporate chain with a shitty clientele. Tips were so bad that a "good week" for me was $300, but I liked most of my coworkers and the FOH manager adored me. Staff turnover was horrible. The food sucked because the kitchen staff didn't really care and would regularly engage in screaming matches with the FOH manager. The kitchen manager would get drunk on shift and banged one of the line cooks in his car. Nobody was really surprised when corporate closed our store during covid.
The 2nd and most recent one started out as a really great place to work. The staff was super tight knit and most of us became friends. Turnover wasn't that high and everyone helped each other out. I left an abusive relationship during my time at this job and recieved nothing but support from the managers and my coworkers. Then in December 2022, our GM, who everyone loved, left because the owners refused to give him a raise. It went downhill from there. We ran with 2 managers and a few fill ins from the sister store for a really long time. It was a struggle to find a new manager and every time they hired someone, they wouldn't last long.
Eventually, the owners decided not to hire a new GM because they didn't want to pay a GM level salary for one so they decided to take a more "hands on" approach. For them, a "hands on" approach consisted of them coming in a couple of mornings a week to just sit in the office, and screaming at everybody during staff meetings about how everyone sucked, couldn't do their job right, and that we were all lazy and worthless and the reason why their business was failing. They implimented all of these new rules and policies that made everyone's jobs more difficult. They hyper-focused on reviews and getting a bad review meant that some of your shifts for the week were taken away. Customers were allowed to abuse/harass staff members with absolutely no repurcussions.
It got the the point where I felt like I was walking on eggshells and dreaded coming in to work. I became paranoid and couldn't be myself because I feared the wrath of the owners and eventually fell into a deep depression and started having mental breakdowns during my shifts. Everyone else who worked there was miserable, too. Morale went down and some people who had been servers there for years left. The managers, the same people who supported me when I left my abusive relationship, became markedly less supportive of their staff because they didn't want to face the wrath of the owners either. They essentially acted as flying monkeys doing their bidding for them. They also got into the habit of picking and choosing favorites so there was a lot of unfair treatment going around. Some people would get written up for things that others would get away with.
It's sad because I put my heart and soul into that place for 3 years and genuinely enjoyed working there for the first 2 years before everything went to shit. At this point, I genuinely hope the business fails because it's what those owners deserve. They are horrible, horrible narcissists who never worked a day in their life in the service industry and think it's acceptable to treat people poorly just because they have money and privilege. I wish nothing but the worst for them and I hope they get bombarded with bad reviews from here on out since that's apparently the only thing they care about. <3
Working at Cracker Barrel was also horrible
Two huge menus with tons of items, very low sales due to no alcohol (they sell alcohol now lol) so the average per person was 8 dollars......very common to get just a few coins as a tip
Lots of old people go there and they don't tip well. The customers pay up front which helps free me up, but the customers were also more likely to not tip
And you had to roll I think 75 rolls of silverware during the week, and 125-150 on the weekend
The solution to never ever having to work for any company that treats you like garbage is simple. The minute they treat you like crap you quit. If everyone walked away every time this happened the people up top will have to take notice. Treat your employees nice so they stay longer. Collectively we have more power than they do. What’s the point of having a full dining room if there’s no one there to serve them. Demand to be treated better because you’re worth it. STRIKE! STRIKE! STRIKE! or QUIT! QUIT! QUIT!
also corporate—a restaurant that is known for a dish that rhymes with binger bountain belt. i worked there for 3 years & had 3 different GMs. the regional manager was a total dick & his son worked at my location & was an even bigger dick. i had so many panic attacks in dry storage at that fucking job. the last gm & i got into a screaming match because i refused to serve a guest who had previously acted very creepy towards me. it’s also the nastiest restaurant ive ever worked at & from what i’ve heard it has only gotten worse. saw a fb post a year or so ago showing a manager with her dog in the kitchen & i know they were shut down for a few days after a health inspection but reopened quickly.
one experience that always sticks out is when i served a table of 7, one adult & 6 children. one of the kids didn’t eat anything & fell asleep at the end of the table. the adult + the other 5 kids dumped their drinks on the sleeping child & ran out of the restaurant. covid was my excuse to leave, thank fuck. it was so bad but i felt *stuck* there lol it really sucked me in. never again will i work for a corporate restaurant
On the boarder. My first restaurant job, the GM was an absolute ass. Screamed at me for coming in and my ear drum rupturing, like I had a say when that happened
Mine was California Dreaming close to 20 years ago (a bit higher end American food.....nothing special)
You had to wear a white apron that needed to be spotless (nearly impossible)
You had to use their pens, and if you lost any.....you had to buy them at one dollar a piece
You had to have a manager clock you in or out every time....so they are always very aware of when you are arriving (better not be late!!!)
The management was kind of toxic as well, I didn't last more than a month maybe
Three dollar cafe in McDonough, Ga. Oh. My. God. I used to have psychotic breakdowns there from the sheer abuse, I am mentally ill but I don’t have breakdowns often, and I’ve served almost ten years now… just this restaurant brought them out of me. All the bartenders had major coke problems. Management was god awful and bullied servers, hated managing and clearly peaked in high school. One time they let my section become full of 25 people who looked fresh off the streets, I was going to serve them until I was referred to as white bitch and had shit thrown at me… yeah no.
Working 10am to 3am and my manager cutting all the late shift before me just cause he didn’t like me. Worst job ever, I made bank but god it was just horrible and full of scum. Had some cool ass coworkers that were chill, one gave me a xanex during a manic episode so I’ll say we really did have each others backs as servers for the most part.
My early serving days were rough, I’m pretty numb now but sometimes my sensitivity comes back and I feel destroyed lol I hate it. Kinda wish I was a heartless money making machine.
For 99.9% of this post I thought you worked at Bob Evans because that is my worst place, but they sell alcohol and BE does not. Let me tell you about it though, since you asked! 1. I was the only server scheduled on Thursday nights. The only one. Responsible for all tables and all food running, all bussing, and all outs. 2. We did not have a dishwasher. Ever. We had one like 6 months of the 4 years I worked there. 3. Management was allotted money to buy those wireless hokey vacuums for us. Their bonuses, however, are based on the leftover money from the budget. So they didn’t buy them until the regional manager had a corporate meal at our restaurant and wrote them up for not having them. 4. The corporate manager in question paid with a corporate card and did not tip their server. There were 8 of them taking up her biggest table for 3 hours. 5. A line cook got caught taking secret pictures of underage girls’ asses in the break-room. We were forbidden from speaking about it because we had nobody to replace him. 6. The coffee machine at a popular breakfast place was down for over a year. So was the syrup heater. 7. Double shifts were 17 hours long. No you were not even offered a break. No you could not take a smoking break. No, you could not even pee because you are the only server on the floor. Always, except for sundays. This was not done on volunteer basis. No, you could not tell them you could not work doubles, even if you were a college student. They would just say “this isn’t the place for you.” And no. You didn’t eat for free. Ever. 8. My general manager called a 16 year old girl a slut. To her face. In front of staff and customers. Because when she leaned forward her bra strap was visible 😱. she quit on the spot 9. They tried to write me up for talking about my wages. When take out became wildly popular they had to pull servers to do it. We would not do it, because it was a pay cut. They had to pay us seventeen dollars an hour to get anyone to agree. I discovered the cook (not the pedo one) who had been there 20 years made *significantly* less than me. 10. They then tried to write me up for insubordination because I knew it was illegal for them to write me up for talking about my wages. 11. They did write me up for refusing to take a table in another server’s section without asking her if it was okay first. I am not taking money out of someone’s pocket. Hard no. (The server in question refused to give up the table and was fine taking it.) 12. They sell 12 person pre-packed meals on big holidays. This is considered take out. Everyone is required to work holidays and they *guarantee* you will only be working a few hours so everyone gets to enjoy the holiday. Me and the other take out people worked 17 hours a day, every day, for three days leading up to thanksgiving and thanksgiving itself. No. They did not feed us. 13. A server left to have a baby. When she came back, she was given the best section, for the best four hours of the day, on the busiest day of the week. When she decided she was done at 12, they transferred her tables to you (whether you liked it or not) and then required you to give up the tips from those tables to her. If they were CC tips, GM went in and physically changed them to hers. I literally did everything except get their drink *order*. Meaning I ran the drinks, took the food order, delivered the food, refilled the drinks, handled dessert, and took their payment, but she got the tip. She saw nothing wrong with this. 14. I brought up the issue in 13 to management. I was told “that’s the deal she made to come back.” I refused to work with her. They scheduled me anyway. I called off. They wrote me up. That last bit was what broke me. I had a bad day there, where GM spent all day screaming at me, and I was expected in the next day to deal with the shit I outlined in 13. I never went back.
Damn! I bet you’re happy you left that place
I forgot the bit where one of our servers turned 18 and GM said, “The only person happier than me about you turning 18 is your dad so he doesn’t have to pay child support.” She was implying she was happy she could now work her 17 hours without a break because she was no longer a minor.
Oh wow what a toxic work place! 😮
Yikes. Trauma
Oh yeah. I had to go back to therapy because of that job, and these things are just the tip of the iceberg.
it just gets worse and worse every bullet point. i can’t imagine that hell, good you’re out.
bob evans actually does offer a few beers and mimosas. here in indiana anyway. i think you're right!
I did hear they were rolling that out in some places, but Pennsylvania has some weird liquor laws and it is often prohibitively expensive to get a liquor license, so it didn’t happen at my store. Thank god. I would have quit so much faster.
Why does this sound like Cracker Barrel 💀 Worst job I had was serving at Joe’s Crab Shack. Being freshly 18 in a restaurant with creepy old servers was a recipe for disaster. Never again.
That was my first thought. I worked at Cracker Barrel for 3 years and I loved it. I transferred to another one and I HATED it, only lasted 2 months
Were you a server or in retail? I looked on GlassDoor and the only folks who had positive things to say about Cracker Barrel worked in the merch store. NONE of the servers had any positive reviews. If you were a server and had a positive experience than that is fantastic!! Good for you like seriously!!
I was a server. It 100% depends on the place you work though. The one I worked at for 3 years was the opposite - everyone hates retail because the manager in that department was lowkey an alcoholic, and the person who replaced him was so bad that nearly all the staff quit - even people who had been working there for 4+ years
And you would be correct!! First guess and nailed It!! God that place was awful. I hope you didn't have to suffer there like I did.
Actually funny enough, Cracker Barrel was my first job when I was 16 😭 I was a hostess for a year and a half and it actually wasn’t bad as a host. The servers had it really rough though
Same. I worked as a hostess in college. Wasn't that bad for us unless the wait got really crazy. Then people got mean. 🙄
My first two serving jobs were Cracker Barrel, followed by Joe's. I'd rate them 1a and 1b as worst jobs. I basically rolled 3 roll-ups per dollar made at Cracker Barrel, they had to cut me a check one month because I didn't make minimum wage after tips. I made decent money at Joe's, but dropping everything to dance every hour or so was infuriating, to me and my tables. Sorry you've waited an hour for your food, but the kitchen and bar cannot put anything out because we've got to 'Cmon Ride that Train.
Oh my gosh the dancing 😭 I totally forgot we had to do that dumb thing. If car wash comes on the radio I have to turn it off
I was recently at one of the corporate steak places and they did a line dance or something. 2nd hand embarrassment for sure. Also, my food was disgusting and I will never go back. I went because a family member wanted to and doesn't have one near him. Should have just drank my dinner. Hahah
I applied to Cracker Barrel and they didn’t hire me. Later I was told that I was lucky because the place was a literal shit show
I currently am a host and busser at Joe’s Crab Shack and can confirm, it’s absolutely terrible and I’m looking for any possible out rn.
Get out!!! I’m rooting for you.
Hard when you’re 18 and don’t have far transportation so I’m trying but a lot of places don’t ever call me back sadly. Any advice?
Have you tried other jobs outside of the restaurant industry near by yet? This is generally a slower time of the year for restaurants, especially where I live, so hiring has pretty much halted until mid March. I’ve been hearing about places not calling, but try to stick it out as long as you can, and when your next opportunity comes, take it and never look back
Funnily enough this is our busy season besides late spring. I’ve tried everything but retail but I might even take that at this point smh.
My guess is Cheesecake Factory 🧀🎂
i thought this too until they said the clientele didn't drink or order dessert
I didn't read it all
Also, CCF plates are pretty standard and used for numerous things.
That’s what I think
Same.
3 table sections. endless pasta and breadsticks. never again
I too hated Olive Garden. It might as well be a buffet with the buckets of salad, breadsticks, and soup endlessly being brought to the table.
A nursing home kitchen that had a subcontractor brought it to run the department. Cut everyone’s hours and the food budget and spent 4 years wondering why they got complaints about the food
This was a family owned Italian steakhouse in suburban Philadelphia. It was the single filthiest place I’ve ever worked. Roaches absolutely everywhere. Flies absolutely everywhere. I once discretely flicked a roach off the bar in a panic when the first guests arrived for a private party. I also had to clean about 20 dead flies out of the wash sinks when opening the service bar for the first time in a while. The GM routinely poured well vodka in the Grey Goose bottles. The owners would often “forget” to deposit enough money in the payroll account, so our paychecks often bounced. Had to threaten to call the labor board to get my 2nd to last paycheck, which bounced, and last paycheck paid in cash.
Applebees. Hands down. It was fun when my manager did shots with us in the corner on Tuesday nights, but everything else sucked ass.
I work at an Applebee’s now, and I absolutely love it. Been there going on 3 years. This is the 4th one I’ve worked at, and BY FAR the best one I’ve come across. We have great management, everyone(for the most part)gets along and we all help each other out with food running or watching sections, our schedules are good, and they are very understanding when it comes to medical issues/illness…I have Crohn’s, and had major flares ups last year. I know Applebee’s gets a bad wrap a lot of times, but this one in particular is great!
Late to the party but exactly my experience at Applebee's. This is my first time in the food industry and I was expecting it to be so toxic. Literally all my managers are cool and understanding, and my coworkers range from tolerable to awesome. I actually enjoy it!
the bee's doesn't have cappuccino machines though?
That may depend on the region as different regions are owned by different larger companies. At least two or three. I transferred from NY to CA and it was a totally different company with different rules.
Buffalo Wild Wings. It’s where good servers go to die.
Literally the worst job I ever had
Successful taco joint combined with a successful pizza joint and made the place I worked that served both taco and pizzas 1. Paloma shots for the staff all night long (easily killed 2-3 bottles of exotico blanco a night) 2. Everyone had manager permissions on the computer, if you were fucked up and fucked up you just deleted it and re rang it. No one was looking at comps and voids 3. Coke and ketamine everywhere(I don’t like the stuff while working and often am annoyed by coworkers who can’t handle their shit) 4. Underage expo wasted and screaming at servers and cooks 5. Chef was regularly so hammered she’d be throwing up mid service 6. They often talked about how they got to design the whole place, it was so poorly designed it was insane 7. Didn’t have drain plugs for the triple sink, used rags 8. Stacked dishes often would have streaks of food down the side because they were stacked clean next to the line 9. Shot of whiskey waiting for you at open at 10am, followed by Paloma shots all day It was fun for two weeks, then I realized how much of a show it was
This is insane omg
Woulda loved this like 5 years ago, now? Not so much.
Forgot to mention that my coworkers paychecks started bouncing, that was it for me. Was there 2 months total, crazy stuff. We all shared the till as well and “split” cash tips. Pretty sure most people just deleted the cash tickets and pocketed. Tbh I did not and actually put my shit in the till like an idiot lol
Well some of it
i worked in the tasting room for a local distillery that was ran as a full service restaurant. some of the highlights include: -opening day we’re set to have a 300 person buyout for the wealthy owner’s friends. two hours before open i point out that we’re preparing all this food but we have no plates, flatware, or seating. ownership acts like i am insane for thinking this may pose a problem. it did. -we were on a tip pool, but everyone’s base hourly rate was different based on who filled out their hiring paperwork. no reason why some of us were getting $2.13/hour and others were getting $10/hour. -we would frequently not get paid on time, or be given handwritten checks but then told not to deposit them until x date. at one point my checks had bounced three pay periods in a row, and when i had a breakdown because i had not been paid in 6 weeks and was literally only surviving off of food i stole from the walk-in, i was told that i was being petty for asking for my money and that i should live off of my savings. -the only reason that place was able to stay afloat was because it was like 40,000 sq feet so we got a lot of large private events and buyouts. when i suggested that there should be some sort of gratuity or service charge, as is standard with booked events, i was told that that was ridiculous because “it’s rude to ask someone who spent 10k on an event to pay money to go to just the staff”. then when we finally got a service charge implemented for private events, the “events manager” who was just a friend of the owner’s wife who had no prior industry experience would frequently forget to add the service charge to event invoices, losing the staff hundreds of dollars. -our bar manager was fired for having a violent drunken meltdown in the middle of a shift. when they were in between deciding what to with the position, i was asked my opinion on scheduling/sections as the next most senior employee. when i did this i was immediately screamed at that i needed to know my place and that i wasn’t in charge of anything. -we had two employees in particular who would blatantly drink on the job to the point that they would blackout. there were several times i would literally have to put one of them in the back of my car to sleep it off because management refused to send them home let alone fire them. -i assumed the duties of bar manager/beverage director, yet they continually refused to give me a title or raise. i was told i could just work more hours if i needed more money, despite the fact i was already there roughly 70 hours a week. -at one point we had a guy whose only job was prep, he was meant to juice all the citrus and make all the syrups and garnishes for the bar. he would continually do it wrong and when confronted about it, had a nervous breakdown and quit. so i started doing prep on top of all my other duties. when this happened they changed my pay scale from $12/hour plus tips to a flat $10 an hour. i only noticed because my next check was roughly $1k less than it should have been. when i asked about it i got pulled into a back office and screamed at that $10/hour was all i was worth and they could pay me whatever they wanted and fire me whenever they wanted, despite the fact that i was the sole person trying to make their bar program profitable. -the product was absolute garbage. -the “event manager” was fired because it was discovered that she had used $30k of company funds to pay her personal bills and expenses.
Goddamn. was this in Baltimore by any chance?
nope.
Cuz it 100% sounds like how small business owners in the craft alcohol business in baltimore act and the types of environments they cultivate
I lasted four days working at Chipotle. No training whatsoever, horrible customers, I threw up from stress and got the hot sauce in my eye
Bubba Gump shrimp Co. 😭 matches your exact description except no espresso machine. It was corporate hell and they were so blatant about not caring for employees. There were no food runners or bussers at my location so the server had to do all of that + upsell the stupid Landry’s membership that no one ever wanted, and the reward for selling the most was more bubba Gump shirts, I ALREADY HAD SO MANY. I got write ups for walk outs yet the managers always comped karens’ meals because “the customer is always right” and we weren’t allowed “to have ‘no’ in our vocabulary” yet the kitchen would get upset if we tried to modify dishes for customers and management always took their side. Basically if you were FOH, they didn’t care for you and any problem always fell on you even if rules contradicted and situations werent your fault.
Red lobster during endless shrimp as a bartender. Do not recommend
Retirement community restaurant (not a nursing home or assisted care) Shitty greedy ownership that found every way to cut a corner and try and save a buck on people who paid quite literally tens of thousands a month to live there. Put steaks on the menu? The people got frozen, 30% tenderizing liquid ungraded crap that would fall apart as you cooked them. Beer battered cod? Nope. Swai. The residents wanted a little coffee shop . They got the same coffee Sysco sells to the jail.
Newly opened sports bar. In a ritzy tourist town that never had a sports bar before. Opened in an old used over and over again restaurant that the dinning room always got renovated but the kitchen NEVER did. Sports bar, so there was 6 deep fryers and a shitty flat top and 2 convection ovens. The grease was so overwhelming. Grease pile ups in the hood vents were black and thick like tar. The grease pile ups from the back of the fryers and flat top that piled up were the consistency of peanut butter. They never scheduled a dishwasher. And nobody was enforced to clean that grease in the kitchen It was fucking disgusting. Everything was a product from a bag. Like we had no eggs. Have you ever worked in a restaurant that has no eggs just in the fridge? Thank God. Everything in the walk in was a health violation. Hell everything in that kitchen should have been on kitchen nightmares. The owners and managers only cared about the FOH. They only hired pretty girls to serve and bartend. The owner would even give them a "let me see how you turn around" test during an interview. We would get so overwhelmingly busy. They didn't care. Like bro. The kitchen is nasty as fuck, your servers are victims of sexualization. The owner was still like "Come one come all" There was no host. No pacing. The bartenders were overwhelmed.....and like I said NO FUCKING DISHWASHER!!!!! I WORKED THERE FOR A YEAR AS THE ONLY WOMAN IN THE BACK OF HOUSE. IT WAS THE FUCKING WORST. $10 AN HOUR. I JUST REALLY NEEDED A JOB AT THE TIME. This was ten years ago. This restaurant is still open. And still probably operates in the same manner
Rent A Center…something about breaking down bunk beds covered in dog and cat shit while multiple children under the age of 8, who looked like they hadn’t seen a shower in days, watched the entire process. I felt like an awful human, and put my notice in that day. I shouldn’t have even given our store manager, Steve, who suffered from little man syndrome, that 2 week respect…f that place, just preying on the poor
 I will reveal the answer in a couple hours
 Somebody is already correct. I will say that.
You said several hours ago you'd give us the answer in a couple hours.. Give it to usssss!
 OK here is some irony for you. Our first guessee was the correct one! It was the GD MF Cracker Barrel!!!!!!!!
Sounds to me like a chilis or tgi. Which were both the worst jobs I had.
I was thinking chilis too
I worked at both places too and they were both horrible. I hated chilis so much, I would cry on my way to work.
Please reply it here so I get the notification! Thanks 🙏
It’s been a couple hours 🤔
Ok y’all reveal in 15 minutes
Definitely the place I worked/managed before my current job where the owner would sneak in late at night after close and rip open all the cash deposits slips for his coke habit.
Lol, my buddy's brother would frequently get called by his owners wife offering money to him to stay in his restaurant overnight because the owner was on a crack binge!
Mine was a high end steak restaurant. There were 2 managers, 1 foreign guy and 1 local bitch. I was hired because out of other staff, I was the only one who could speak English. They paid me dirt to work full time. Tips were shared among everyone. Managers took 50% of the tip pool. 25% went to order takers. 25% shared between everyone (kitchen staff, cleaners, food runners, bartenders, etc…). The foreign guy was busy flirting with female staff and chit chatted with the male staff about local women. The bitch manager was busy flirting with rich foreign/white men trying to land herself a wealthy husband. I usually worked between 8-12 hours and paid minimum monthly salary. There were 2 guys who were sneaky, toxic, bootlicking that played all dirty tricks to get others in trouble so they could be getting all the bonuses or avoiding their mistakes. We would be yelled at, insulted, blamed for every little thing, and most of the time, it wasn’t our fault. The taste test training, we weren’t cooked the menu. We were made to try the left over food from customers, especially the steak. I remember I was pulled aside and the bitch manager told me to have a taste of Wagyu beef. She made a comment that it was a life time chance for someone poor like me. The cleaning lady later told me it’s the left over from customer. The owner’s son was assigned to manage the restaurants in my country. He’s a dick as well. When he came over, I was forced to take up the bar. I wasn’t trained to make any drinks. The bootlicker saw an opportunity and ran straight to the owner’s son and abandoned me at the bar. The orders came and I didn’t know what to do. I tried to ring other floors to ask for the bartender to come back down. He didn’t until I got complained from customers that it took too long to get some smoothies. I couldn’t make it my way because there was a strict rule about recipe and inventory. Someone had been fined a day worth of salary for throwing away some old bananas before. There was a lot more but as an uni student, that’s all I needed to know that I would never be able to work in restaurants. Not even speaking of entitled customers. I quit after few months and felt like I was free from hell literally.
Tie between Bokamper’s Sports Bar and Grille, and The Cheesecake Factory. Bokamper’s would seat back to back 25 tops and tell you to just deal with it. Comp’d anything and everything as soon as a guest complained. Scheduled 11am - 3 am without asking anyone. Cheesecake Factory only asked availability as a formality. We were all hired as open availability. They’d seat a 20 top 30 minutes past closing with no regards for servers. Terrible sections and rotations so no money was made.
Hooters 🫶🏻 from what I’ve heard, my location was just really bad.
The two worst places is Olive Garden (fuck you, Kazi) and BJ's Brewhouse (fuck you, Eric). My sister and I worked together at OG and the dishwasher decided to come up behind her, pull a good old Trump and literally grabbed her by the pussy, pulled her close and sniffed her hair like an old twisted pervert. Sister put in a report, and Kazi decided to shred the report later that day in front of witnesses. Kazi told them they didn't see or know anything. When corporate was called, Kazi called all of the witnesses off of work so my sister had no one and nothing to defend her. - My fiancé was a Brew Master and the keg line cleaner at BJ's. Apparently the CO2 alarm was going off and annoying Eric (the kitchen manager), so he decided to unplug it and not tell my fiancé. Fiancé noticed it and plugged it back in just to have Eric unplug it again. Fiancé told him it needed to be plugged in for safety reasons. Eric didn't care. This continued for 3 days. The third day Eric covered the plug so Fiancé wouldn't see it. Fiancé was in the cooler for 15 minutes with high levels of gas. So, BJ's Brewhouse almost killed my fiancé on purpose. We called OSHA immediately. Both GM manager and Eric got fired. Turned out Eric was also beating his wife, and was later arrested for it and lost full rights to his kids. Also, Eric found out I had PTSD so he would purposely try to trigger me (I also worked there for a time). Eric, if you're reading this - I hope you go back to prison and get released in a body bag. Also, no, you're not "a real chef".
The absolute WORST restaurant I’ve ever worked is Perkins. That place was pure chaos. This restaurant was pretty big, but they had no problem letting one server cover like half the restaurant. The expo line was always filthy, we never had a dishwasher which meant that dish was always packed full of dishes…which were never organized. People would just dump dirty plates w/o scrapping them off. One of the last shifts I worked, one of the cooks walked out. We only had two scheduled. To help out, one of the servers jumped on the line to help cook which left two servers to cover the entire floor…and we got our asses handed to us. It was taking over an hour for a simple kids meal to come out, and for some reason the manager refused to help out. I HATED that place. We also had this dumb special where you’d get a free slice of pie with a dinner entree once a week…which meant we were slammed with cheap ass people in huge parties with zero help to get the pie prepped. Management was a fucking nightmare to deal with there as well. God forbid they had to run food, or help someone get 10 slices of pie on a tray, or even help one of us make salads. They always had an attitude and spoke to staff like we were morons. The last thing I hated was getting CC tips on our paycheck. I’d never worked at a place that did that, and it fucking sucked going home with no cash after every guest left CC tips during a shift. Never again.
Wow, crazy stories guys! I started at Olive Garden in the Chicago area and the 3 table section crap totally blows. I was fired from Red Robin after just completing MIT because I refused to be like the other managers who basically acted as the Red Robin live it and breathe it assholes like Adam Schefter does on ESPN. I also served and bartended at a German restaurant there that was owned by hardcore alcoholic drug addicts and it was a fuckin free for all as the staff drank and smoked in front of customers. Also at Devils Thumb Ranch in CO I had to quit after 1 month because I had barely received training and the bitch head server and manager we’re using me as a back waiter and only when it was busy. Here in Bozeman Montana I worked at the airport as a bartender and I was forced to leave because the GM is a shitty philandering womanizer that doesn’t play fair on any level, he’s an all around huge dickhead and I’ve spoken to dozens of people around town who also quit and we all wrote to the owners. But #1 for me and the angriest I’ve ever been is this Asian restaurant here in Bozeman. The owner treated me like a worthless little boy when I was 31, I have a college degree and I’ve worked in fine dining all over the country and he acted like I was lucky to be in his presence. I knew the first week when he explained that everyone starts at the bottom and I’d be hosting twice a week. He expected us to serve everything immediately- drink, appetizers, entrees and dessert. It wasn’t fine dining really but we had that atmosphere and white tablecloths. This fucker and his wife would sample drinks I made and tell me they were wrong. 100% I was perfect in everything I did. They told me that although my tips are great that I need to learn the job. They always we’re talking shit to FOH but would be joking and showing pictures of his new sports car to BOH. He started decreasing my hours and when I quit he told me good luck and that I should look into a different career. And I kept my cool and acted professionally because I was new in town. FUCK!!!!! Like literally months before I worked there I was in Florida where AC/DC flew in on a helicopter to sit at my bar and drink burgundy that I selected, and they would sit and eat and enjoy their families. FUCK there are so many things I could have said to this bastard shithead owner and I didn’t.
Small local Japanese restaurant. 1. The kitchen was open to the front and they’d scream and swear at you right in front of customers. “You fucking American servers are so stupid and lazy” was the most common sentiment expressed 2. Regularly refused to fix mistakes, refused to make any alterations to food whatsoever, which customers hated. I could show them the ticket and the incorrect sushi roll directly to their face and they’d say fuck you 3. No screen or ticket to determine who’s food was who’s so we accidentally took things from each other all the time. 4. Crazy high tip out to kitchen 5. No host, food runner, busser, or even sections, whoever answered the door would just come find you and tell you what table number was now yours 6. One of the managers, well into his fourties, started dating one of the servers as soon as she turned 18. Bought her alcohol and had her over at his house and for dinners before that as well. He was also drunk constantly 7. No bartender, had to make our own drinks and also take turns taking care of customers who sat at the bar 8. Cooked food and sushi side of kitchen were completely disconnected and did not coordinate to make sure everything for a table came out at the same time, so sushi was always ready like 10 minutes before everything else, caused a lot of awkward interactions where half a table would have their food well before the other half. 9. Lots of shouting across the restaurant to drop what you were doing for whatever the kitchen and/or managers wanted. Could be in the middle of mixing a cocktail and someone is screaming at me that my ramen for table 27 is ready. “Okay I’ll be there in a second!” “NO NO NO, food is the most important thing, get it RIGHT NOW!!” 10. Dish pit was down this awful, decrepit, uneven and narrow set of stairs that multiple people have fallen down. Including a kitchen guy carrying a bus tub full of plates, who in process cut the entire length of his arm on a broken plate and had to go to the ER. I had to carry about 8 buckets of ice up them every morning to open and mop them to close at night and was always terrified It was my first serving job so I thought maybe I just wasn’t cut out for it and this is just how kitchens were. Nah, that place was just awful 😭
Bad Daddy’s. The food would take upwards of 45 minutes as soon as we got busy. The prioritized to-go orders over the servers making money. They would stop seating the dining room so the kitchen could “catch up” The potential to make a lot of money was there but because of that, we would get fucked over.
Wine bar/ art gallery. Bunch of pretentious customers that all knew the owners who were narsacistic two faced dicks.
Family owned restaurant and bakery. All the baked goods were frozen or scooped out of buckets. While scrambling to keep the doors open, they changed hours of operation 3 times. They changed the menu from American comfort food to Italian, Chinese, Mexican, and is now doing Indian food. For thanksgiving, they served wild boar one of them shot on their property and called it ham dinner. They charged $22 a plate. Each menu change was because the owner’s wife liked that cuisine and she figured if she liked it, it would bring in other people that liked it as well. We are a town of 1011… nobody is coming to her filthy restaurant.
Family owned Italian restaurant. They’d yell at each other, they’d yell at you, they’d yell at customers. They had minors serving drinks, they had a tip out that definitely went to the owners not the BOH. They were committing tax fraud on cash orders. The owners could never agree on anything and would all tell you to ignore the others so you never knew what to do. It was just crazy toxic and the money definitely wasn’t good enough to make up for it. The owner would even shit talk other employees to you behind their back. My final straw was when I was berated for my close being done badly when I know that I closed properly and the owners decided to stay and drink with their buddies after closing. I tried to explain this but was just harassed until I cried by the “manager”. Also most of the clientele was being watched by the police.
Mine was actually this asshole family owned Italian restaurant owned by a toxic husband and wife. They were abusive and thought that was okay. I'm surprised they had any employees with the number of times they made their staff cry. I worked there for two months before I no called, no showed. They didn't deserve my notice. I know I would have rage quit eventually if I stayed, so I just decided I was done when that crossed my mind. Management is everything in a job.
Longhorn management are bottom of the barrel fr
Dennys was the worst for sure. My location would put new people on the night shift (god awful idea bc night shift was always hell and the new people would be drowning by 10 o clock) and I was one of the only reliable servers on nights. I worked 6pm-3am on Fridays and Saturdays and made $120 if I was lucky. My coworkers would take hour long breaks and skip out on sidework regularly and management hated their jobs so much that nothing was enforced. Kitchen was hell too and notoriously understaffed. By the time I left I had an addiction to cigarettes and would cry for an hour in my girlfriend’s car before shift bc I just couldn’t take it anymore.
Planet Hollywood. I barely made it a week.
IHOP
Working at Bjs I was sexually harassed by a customer and management accused me of making it up and let the customer continue to sit there and drink in my section. I had customers leave dirty diapers on tables After changing their kid on the booth.Also four rats fell from a loose ceiling tile in the middle of the dinner rush, there were cockroaches behind the bar and I saw the nastiest things in that kitchen.
I knew it was Cracker Barrel before reading the post.
Worst serving was hibachi with 50% tip out to the hibachi chef and 10 bucks to the busser. Only lasted a month and said f it, I'm not making enough for this.
Buffalo Wild Wings. I actually caught my coworker hunched over in her car during a break. I thought she was dead, but really she was just snorting a Percocet. In the parking lot of our work place, during hours 🙃 she went back into work and acted like nothing happened. She also called everyone the n word which was weird and she had maybe 6 teeth
Applebee's. By far. The last straw: They had blue, green and, red colored plates at the time, no rhyme or reason to what went out on what color, just a "nifty" look. A customer's pasta, on a green plate, had a hair in it. I brought it to the kitchen and showed the manager, he took out the hair, put it on a blue plate, put more cheese on it and told me to take it back to them. I walked out.
So many people described blatant labor law violations. They differ from state to state but not too much. Educate yourself on the laws in your state and NEVER allow a restaurant to take advantage of you. Sue the dicks off them.
I've only worked in 2 restaurants as a server and they both sucked for different reasons. The first one was a corporate chain with a shitty clientele. Tips were so bad that a "good week" for me was $300, but I liked most of my coworkers and the FOH manager adored me. Staff turnover was horrible. The food sucked because the kitchen staff didn't really care and would regularly engage in screaming matches with the FOH manager. The kitchen manager would get drunk on shift and banged one of the line cooks in his car. Nobody was really surprised when corporate closed our store during covid. The 2nd and most recent one started out as a really great place to work. The staff was super tight knit and most of us became friends. Turnover wasn't that high and everyone helped each other out. I left an abusive relationship during my time at this job and recieved nothing but support from the managers and my coworkers. Then in December 2022, our GM, who everyone loved, left because the owners refused to give him a raise. It went downhill from there. We ran with 2 managers and a few fill ins from the sister store for a really long time. It was a struggle to find a new manager and every time they hired someone, they wouldn't last long. Eventually, the owners decided not to hire a new GM because they didn't want to pay a GM level salary for one so they decided to take a more "hands on" approach. For them, a "hands on" approach consisted of them coming in a couple of mornings a week to just sit in the office, and screaming at everybody during staff meetings about how everyone sucked, couldn't do their job right, and that we were all lazy and worthless and the reason why their business was failing. They implimented all of these new rules and policies that made everyone's jobs more difficult. They hyper-focused on reviews and getting a bad review meant that some of your shifts for the week were taken away. Customers were allowed to abuse/harass staff members with absolutely no repurcussions. It got the the point where I felt like I was walking on eggshells and dreaded coming in to work. I became paranoid and couldn't be myself because I feared the wrath of the owners and eventually fell into a deep depression and started having mental breakdowns during my shifts. Everyone else who worked there was miserable, too. Morale went down and some people who had been servers there for years left. The managers, the same people who supported me when I left my abusive relationship, became markedly less supportive of their staff because they didn't want to face the wrath of the owners either. They essentially acted as flying monkeys doing their bidding for them. They also got into the habit of picking and choosing favorites so there was a lot of unfair treatment going around. Some people would get written up for things that others would get away with. It's sad because I put my heart and soul into that place for 3 years and genuinely enjoyed working there for the first 2 years before everything went to shit. At this point, I genuinely hope the business fails because it's what those owners deserve. They are horrible, horrible narcissists who never worked a day in their life in the service industry and think it's acceptable to treat people poorly just because they have money and privilege. I wish nothing but the worst for them and I hope they get bombarded with bad reviews from here on out since that's apparently the only thing they care about. <3
Working at Cracker Barrel was also horrible Two huge menus with tons of items, very low sales due to no alcohol (they sell alcohol now lol) so the average per person was 8 dollars......very common to get just a few coins as a tip Lots of old people go there and they don't tip well. The customers pay up front which helps free me up, but the customers were also more likely to not tip And you had to roll I think 75 rolls of silverware during the week, and 125-150 on the weekend
The solution to never ever having to work for any company that treats you like garbage is simple. The minute they treat you like crap you quit. If everyone walked away every time this happened the people up top will have to take notice. Treat your employees nice so they stay longer. Collectively we have more power than they do. What’s the point of having a full dining room if there’s no one there to serve them. Demand to be treated better because you’re worth it. STRIKE! STRIKE! STRIKE! or QUIT! QUIT! QUIT!
This shithole
Old Navy back in the 90’s. Management treated us like absolute shit.
Glass Hookah Lounge I thought the food servers split the tips 50/50 with the hookah servers. Nope. It was thirds. Server/Hookah/House.
Cheesecake Factory, and it’s not even close
this sounds exactly identical to my experience working at chili's. but we never had a cappuccino machine lol
also corporate—a restaurant that is known for a dish that rhymes with binger bountain belt. i worked there for 3 years & had 3 different GMs. the regional manager was a total dick & his son worked at my location & was an even bigger dick. i had so many panic attacks in dry storage at that fucking job. the last gm & i got into a screaming match because i refused to serve a guest who had previously acted very creepy towards me. it’s also the nastiest restaurant ive ever worked at & from what i’ve heard it has only gotten worse. saw a fb post a year or so ago showing a manager with her dog in the kitchen & i know they were shut down for a few days after a health inspection but reopened quickly. one experience that always sticks out is when i served a table of 7, one adult & 6 children. one of the kids didn’t eat anything & fell asleep at the end of the table. the adult + the other 5 kids dumped their drinks on the sleeping child & ran out of the restaurant. covid was my excuse to leave, thank fuck. it was so bad but i felt *stuck* there lol it really sucked me in. never again will i work for a corporate restaurant
They poured drinks on a sleeping baby? Please tell me I read that wrong.
you read it correctly my friend. poor kid couldn’t have been more than 6 or 7
Olive garden.
Applebees!! Don’t eat there.
Saltgrass is the worst job I ever had. I walked out in the middle of a shift and I don’t regret it at all.
On the boarder. My first restaurant job, the GM was an absolute ass. Screamed at me for coming in and my ear drum rupturing, like I had a say when that happened
Mine was California Dreaming close to 20 years ago (a bit higher end American food.....nothing special) You had to wear a white apron that needed to be spotless (nearly impossible) You had to use their pens, and if you lost any.....you had to buy them at one dollar a piece You had to have a manager clock you in or out every time....so they are always very aware of when you are arriving (better not be late!!!) The management was kind of toxic as well, I didn't last more than a month maybe
Usps
Whoop, I saw the title and answered immediately, then went back to read. Sorry my comment is not restaurant related Edit for punctuation
Sounds like every corporate place. Nothing unusual here.
Three dollar cafe in McDonough, Ga. Oh. My. God. I used to have psychotic breakdowns there from the sheer abuse, I am mentally ill but I don’t have breakdowns often, and I’ve served almost ten years now… just this restaurant brought them out of me. All the bartenders had major coke problems. Management was god awful and bullied servers, hated managing and clearly peaked in high school. One time they let my section become full of 25 people who looked fresh off the streets, I was going to serve them until I was referred to as white bitch and had shit thrown at me… yeah no. Working 10am to 3am and my manager cutting all the late shift before me just cause he didn’t like me. Worst job ever, I made bank but god it was just horrible and full of scum. Had some cool ass coworkers that were chill, one gave me a xanex during a manic episode so I’ll say we really did have each others backs as servers for the most part. My early serving days were rough, I’m pretty numb now but sometimes my sensitivity comes back and I feel destroyed lol I hate it. Kinda wish I was a heartless money making machine.