Restaurant Cleanliness

We had dinner last night at Longhorn Steakhouse. I had a gift-card, from Christmas, that we used. Funny, and not part of the topic here, but we both wore our western attire, plus black felt cowboy hats. As always, my wife got some "looks", as well as I did. But, there were a few men in the restaurant there were wearing cowboy hats also. The restaurant is in Ft. Collins where CSU (Colorado State University) is and they have a college rodeo team there.

Anyway, the place was packed with a Waiting List for a table. While we were eating, I noticed a young lady busing/cleaning off a table next to us. She had gathered up all of the dishes on the table and proceeded to wipe the table off. A young lady that had been having dinner at the table, had a shrimp skewer and rice. IOW, I look around quite a bit and noticed this. Anyway, some of her rice had wound up on the table. While wiping off the table, the bus girl wiped the rice onto the chairs and floor next to the table. She left a few pieces of rice on the table and, after wiping each chair, there was some rice still on one of the chairs.

I really thought an employee would come along with a roller-broom and clean up the rice on the floor. That didn't happen. When we left, there was nobody at that table yet and the rice was still on the floor.

We both remember being in Longhorn Steakhouse, like the two we were in (Jacksonville and St Augustine Florida) that were super clean and someone would use a roller-broom if something was on the floor.

I know this is the manager's job to make sure the dining areas are totally clean, so it really seemed like this manager didn't really care. It was almost like "cattle call". That means, "get them seated, order taken, meal delivered, meal eaten and out of there" The fast people can be seated and gone, the more money a restaurant can make.

As for us, we like a well-kept, and clean, restaurant! And, apparently, not everyone has our feelings about how a descent restaurant should look. That is sad!

Thoughts?

 

Did you ever think of a career in Stand-Up Comedy? You are darn good at it.

 

Everyone should work in a busy restaurant at least once in their life so they can get an education as to what restaurant workers go through to please the public.

That “uncaring” manager you’re writing about could have been in the kitchen expediting food or washing dishes or even on the other side of the restaurant bussing tables or putting up with some Karen complaining about her Fllet Mignon tasting like meat instead of fish.
That same manager probably puts in 12-16 hours a day and during peak hours is doing whatever is needed to get legs under tables and then get them out again and repeat.
The only thing I read in your complaint that would need to be addressed are the actions of the bus person cleaning the table. He or she should have either swept the rice or whatever from the table into the bus pan or tray or a plate.
The truth of it all is that many bus and utility people aren’t there because they want to be in the restaurant business and as long as they get a check at the end of the week, that’s all they’re interested in which is why the turnover is so great.

Now, my best recommendation for anyone who gets offended because the floor in a restaurant gets messy during a slam is to not go to restaurants during peak hours which are normally between 5:30-8:00 PM.
Go at 4:00 and be able to sit worry free of being subjected to bad service or rice on the floor.

 

Yup. We have a IHOP that’s supposed to be a 24 hr. house but sometimes closes as early as 2:00 PM, as an unscheduled closing.
One of the worse things a restaurant can do is to confuse the public about the service hours but when we asked about the problem, we were told that their schedule is dependent upon how many employees show up for work.

 

Well, Bobby, I don't care about how "lacking" bus people are, it still looks bad when a "supposedly" nice/descent restaurants floor has food laying on it. And, btw, the restaurant manager was up front where people give their name for the Waiting List. In my eyes, he should be, at times, taking a walking around the dining area and checking it out. I've actually had the "checking it out" happen before and it was rather nice to see a manager doing that. He stopped by our table and said "how is everything?".

There are some people who don't care about how clean the floor is, because the floor in their own home can look the same way.

A Waffle House we use to eat breakfast at in Jacksonville, Florida, the Host at the door, whose name was Lyon, kept the dining area so clean, a person could eat off of the floor. The guy was wonderful! After he left, we had to keep asking the new Host to sweep the floor under our table before we sat down at it.

 

I'll bet Lyon is not even working there anymore because its too damn stressful with help missing This is a different time than when you lived there.

 

After Lyon left, we continued to eat breakfast there, that's why we knew the new host wasn't nearly as good as Lyon was. There are hosts that care about their job, and the way the dining area looks, and, obviously, those that don't.

It's really weird how there are customers who care about the way the dining area looks and those that don't.

 

My secular career for 53 years was spent in the food and beverage industry (and some construction) of which you have no knowledge other than picking up your knife and fork and eating whatever you ordered and it looks like, complaining.

If you complained about the food or the service then I can roll with that but to base your entire experience on some rice on the floor? Personally, I’d comp your check and ask you not to come back.
That goes double for the Waffle House thing. If each time you walked in, you demanded that the table area be swept before you sat down even though the table and seats were clean, about the 2nd or 3rd time you did that I’d hand you a broom. Trust me, I’ve had some continual complainers and I’ve gone to some extraordinary lengths to make sure they didn’t come back.

If a restaurant is always filthy, then no one should go there and should be reported to the health department. If the service or food is substandard, then don’t go back. That said, if the cockroach killers you wear on your feet can’t stand a few grains of rice or some toast crumbs especially when the place is being slammed, you need to eat at home.

The food and beverage industry is the hardest industry with the hardest working people I have ever been around which is why I have absolutely no mercy for a constant complainer.
The food service industry is all about making people happy but there are those who wouldn’t be happy even if they were given a bag of money each time they walked in. Nothing is ever good enough for a Karen.

 

Bobby, we aren't "Karens"! Then again, all of those on this forum that complain about the vaccines, Biden or whatever are indeed "Karens" as well. What we are, however, are customers that paid a good price for a fillet steak and a lobster tail dinners and desire a clean dining room floor. I've been in restaurants where the floor was spotless. There are those that don't care how dirty a high-priced restaurant is. That is not us! We like restaurants that take pride in not only how their kitchen looks, but how their dining area looks also.

Don't really care about your past employment history. Heck, guy, there are things even you complain about. Does that mean you are a "Karen" also???

As far as us asking the floor to be swept under the table we are eating at, nothing wrong with that. Again, there are those that care and those that don't. If told "never come back again", saying that would definitely make local news headlines. Just saying.

Now, if you like going out to dinner and don't mind seeing a messy floor, that's you, but definitely not us. When a two dinners come out to be around $60 or so, cleanliness isn't a request, it's a necessity.

 

you're like a little baby...You whine about everything.

 

Without mentioning any names, so do many on this forum. In case you haven't notice. Do you want to call all of them "a little baby"?

 

Actually, I thought, but might be wrong, that Ken has a forum policy against calling members names.