Tuesday, January 11, 2011 at 9:01AMHollywood's Restaurant Managers and What They Teach Us
Joy Paley is a guest blogger for Pounding the Pavement and a writer on electrician school for the Guide to Career Education.
Restaurants are a huge part of American popular culture. In movies and on TV, restaurants are the scene of first dates, where friends go to relax and hang out, and where many an unfortunate soul has dinner with their in-laws. While these restaurants may exist only on screen, as restaurant managers, we can still learn a lot from their triumphs and foibles. Here are five famous restaurants that exist only in Hollywood, and the good and the bad lessons they can teach us.
Merlotte’s Bar and Grill
Merlotte’s is nearly a fixture of every episode of True Blood, HBO’s hugely popular vampire series. The bar, owned and managed by Sam Merlotte, is a magnet for the weirdos of the town of Bon Temps, including vampires and shape-shifters.
Unfortunately, Sam often forgets the crucial restaurant manager maxim of customer service, by routinely hiring employees that are openly rude to the customers. Some of these saucy waitresses end up dead, due to their lack of common courtesy to the rather eccentric patrons. Outside of Bon Temps, you can’t expect your customers to off your employees in the event of terrible service, and it’s your job as a restaurant manager to keep your staff in line with the message you want to send to your patrons.
The Max
Who can’t forget The Max, from Saved by the Bell? While the snazzy, laid-back, TV restaurant is probably a lot more impressive than most teens’ actual hangouts, real-life restauraunteurs can take a lesson from Max, The Max’s eponymous manager. He knew his target market, and he did he all he could to bring those teens in. Max let Zach have a telethon out of the restaurant to raise money for the school radio station, and he also had The Max host school dance contests. Max recognized that he could do more to create loyal teenage customers than just serving food.
Chotchkie’s
In the movie Office Space, Chotchkie’s is equivalent to your neighborhood Chili’s or TGI Friday’s, run by the completely clueless Stan. Stan reminds all of us restaurant managers how we need to respect our employees, or we’ll end up driving away all the good ones. While customer service is key, constantly railing on your employees about minor details like wearing enough “flair” (buttons on their suspenders) is only going to cause their service to drop and a lot of resentment to accumulate.
Shenaniganz
Yet another TGI Friday’s restaurant wannabe brings to mind an obvious but crucial managing lesson: cleanliness. In the movie Waiting, Dean, a waiter at Shenaniganz, must decide if he’s going to commit to the restaurant biz for life, or if he’s interested in something more. Meanwhile, the uptight manager Dan has no control over what is happening in the kitchen, as the vomit-inducing “cook’s special” is being whipped up for some arguably deserving customers. Shenaniganz reminds us how, unlike Dan, a great manager monitors cleanliness standards as if his own family were eating there on a daily basis.
Luke’s Diner
Luke’s Diner of the TV show Gilmore Girls is a lucky establishment: it’s the only restaurant in town, so customers keep coming back, no matter what. In Luke’s world, the key managing rule of consistency isn’t so important. When he’s feeling pissed, patrons get thrown out over the smallest complaints, but during other times, he caters to their every need. In reality, though, restaurant managers should be wary of Luke’s example. Customers will only keep coming back if you have a consistent track record of great food and service.
Reader Comments (5)
What about Cheers? That was an idealized version of a neighborhood bar where everyone knows your name. Al's on Happy Days or Mel's Diner on Alice nothing gross in those. Julia Roberts eating here way through Italy in Eat Pray Love or Amy Adams and Meryl Streep in Julie/Julie ccoking up a storm were wonderful in showing restaurants and food service.
Writer's or directors need to focus in and expand on worse case scenes for the comedy or gross out effects. More harm than good was done with Rocco Despirito's realtiy TV show on NBC on the trials and tribulations of opening a restaurant and everything that can wrong with it. Having lived and worked through these things, I couldn't watch seeinga whole day or two worth of disasters condensed into 1/2 hour 'Reality TV'. Same reasons I can't watch 'When Sharks Attacks' or any National Geographic special with lions or tigers or alligators attacking and eating.
I love True Blood and never think twice about the lack of customer service and who is getting killed in the parking lot. The show is about vampires, duh!
Waiting has the great character actor Luis Guzman as the chef, tell me that was not up there with Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential. Workers passing through American restaurants while they decide to figure out what to do with their life, this is a surprise?
So lighten up and remember Robin Williams when thinking about his next job after Popeye, 'You want fries with that'
Good Stuff, David. Appreciate your comments.
And what about the scene in "Five Easy Pieces" where Jack Nicholas asks his server to modify the sandwich?
I think a restaurant setting is the perfect venue for Hollywood because it can personify everything about our American culture, whether your scolding someone out of a bowl of soup (“No soup for you”) or proving that the female climax can indeed be faked (“I’ll have what she’s having”).
It’s all about the people. Just don’t forget those scenarios are in Hollywood. What we deal with day to day is quite different.
Although there are lessons to be learned in all aspects of life the reality is this. Many television restaurants are like everything on t.v. the object is to keep the viewers engaged. So more often than not scenarios will be stretched. As a person in the restaurant buisness for 20+ years I have come across a plethora of scenarios. For me the good thing about tv restaurants is there are things we can do vicariously through the tv scenes.
Thanks for your thoughts, C. Tyler.