Sunday, April 22, 2007

What One Restaurant Owner Has To Say About You!

This is Chapter One: Dissection of a Blog.


Just for fun, I decided…how great would it be to dissect someone else’s blog?! Genius you say, right? Well this blog is REEEEEAAAAALLLLLLYYYY long, but I actually think it's worth the time...so pull up a comfy chair, grab a beer and have a go at it!

SO…I choose a candidate that has a lot to say, someone who has some sort of position in society (ok, by no means is this any sort of relevant position, but it’s a business owner. Someone who is in the service industry, which in most cases means they are in the industry of servicing people. What is the old saying about this industry? The customer is always right. When you run a business that people actually come to, an actual place where people physically place themselves and pay money for a product or service, you damn well better offer them the best. You damn well better offer them WHAT THEY WANT.

How many people out there believe this to be true?

If you have a store that sells paper and someone comes to you for paper…you better give them paper…not paper scented dog turds. It just won’t cut it folks. Pretty soon, people are going to go somewhere else for their paper…and your good name is going with them. The power of the people is quite a powerful thing in the retail and service industry. (Of course, there are some exceptions for that, considering that some people have NO STANDARDS AT ALL. Some people actually like paper scented dog shit.)

Ok. So, I will not tell you the name of the blogger or the business name for that matter. I want you to be able to view the screenshots with an unbiased eye, a blog in its entirety, you make your own opinion about it. The blog in question is/was originally posted on a public website, anyone is open to read it, so I am not technically divulging any type of “secrets” or things that the blogger doesn’t want the whole world to know. I am also not liable for making any sort of false accusation about the blog owner. I am simply showing you what I read, then giving you my opinion about it.


Enjoy!



If the customers look at the menu and they are disappointed, and it is happening a lot...you think you would change the menu. I've worked at many restaurants...when something isn't working...it's gone. Any corporate restaurant will take the complaints and use them as constructive criticism. I have studied the menu. In this case, the blogger is forgetting to mention that her Italian restaurant offers it's patrons a choice of a baked potato or pasta with every meal. For every 10 customers, 7 ask about the baked potato. That is not confirmed statistics...just a generalization of the comments received from people.

The blogger also makes a comment about "the painful ordeal". I don't think people would be happy knowing that this restaurant owner considers taking orders from her paying customers a "painful ordeal". I would think that the majority of people who live in this area would boycott her business just for that comment alone.



Wow. Ok, so these people are really picky and they are obviously insane since they didn't like the chicken. Her fault, not yours. Nothing you can do about that, right? Sorry...the customer is ALWAYS wrong.



Unhappy about life in general. Does this restaurant owner have a degree in psychology too! That is amazing, instead of trying to make this customer happy...so they don't tell everyone they know how bad your restaurant sucks...you decide that they are unhappy in their life and this is the sole reason they thought your chicken sucked. HMMM...really



It is hard these days to find decent drug free workers. Especially trained chefs and line cooks who will work for way, WAY less than every other restaurant in town! Amazing how that works huh! You pay decent wages and you get decent employees. Not transient, never cooked a meal in their life, breaking into your joint and stealing your supplies type employees. It's cause and effect lady. Didn't you learn that in first grade...because I think everyone around you did and it's a decent lesson in life to have a firm grasp on.



OOPS! Too late. (And i've got 5 more entries to dissect...i've got a feeling you've shared entirely too many details already!)



Again...what a waste of a good Phd degree! Why the hell are you peddling pasta when you could be making $200 an hour diagnosing people's alleged problems?! Why can't you tell them that? They're your employees right? You can tell the whole damn world in a blog that you think they need help...but you can't tell them to their face? This blogger is not only loose lipped on the world wide web, she's also a coward in real life.



You mean to tell me the company who owns the mall that you lease a spot in, for your restaurant...wants to check up on the quality of service that you're putting out! You mean to tell me that the company who owns the space YOU ARE RENTING want to see whether or not you are bringing customers to their establishment and contributing SOMETHING to the goodness of the mall?! How outragious is that! How dare they! I'm sure that is totally not kosher for that company to be protecting their investment in you! With this attitude, i'm not surprised that you failed...and again...it probably comes as no surprise to anyone reading this, that you believe the sercret shopper has a "grudge" or a "chip on her shoulder"!?!

Am I in the twilight zone? Is this lady for real?

A secret shopper who is hired to go to restaurants, is an important person...they get to judge you on everything, from a consumer point of view. These are actually consumers that get paid to eat in your restaurant...they aren't your arch rival from your old highschool cheerleading squad, they're not your husbands mistress, they're not the slacky waitresses you fired...they don't get paid to have "chips" on their shoulders. If beauty is in the eye of the beholder...and the mall owners don't like your style...I guess you are shit out of luck. Maybe next time you should consider BUYING a commercial property so you don't have to deal with pesky landlords wanting to make a profit.

But I give you an A++ for the effort of excuses as to why you failed, you should write a book lady. This stuff is seriously too funny for words! It's called reality...you should check into it.



What a shame that she can't hire people who do sidework, or wash windows, or mop floors, or organize supplies, or find things to clean. She shouldn't be discriminating against all those crazy tweekers...they've got a lot of energy to burn...you could find them things to clean for days and days. Or maybe because you bitch and whine about everything and wrongly diagnose your employees all the good ones left? Maybe folks are standing around because you ain't telling them to do anything?!

I get the feeling this blogger isn't quite telling us EVERYTHING.

So now this blog is becoming quite tedious, if I do say so myself. And everyone knows I like the sound of my fingers on the keyboards almost as much as I like the sound of my voice...but really...where am I going with this?

Time to really just post the completely ridiculous, horribly unprofessional like details of our restaurant owners blog...hold on a moment while I gather up the rest of the really juicy tid-bits of 5 more posts...BRB...



Good attitude. So how are you going to ever have a committed employee when you don't want to hear they're committed?!?! I'm confused...you want people who are committed and are never going to leave you, but you don't want them to act like they are committed or bother you with solemn vows of their commitment. So how the hell do you determine what sort of employee they are?! Sounds like you wouldn't be happy if a million dollar bill was shoved up your ass because, "Ouchies, it hurts!!"



Hmm. So someone who was not qualified to be doing a certain job got a big head and thought they were better than everyone else...hypothetically speaking, that would be similiar to someone who takes horse riding lessons and then buys a stable and a bunch of race horses and loses an assload of money at the track. Or say, a person who gets a wild hair up their ass, goes to culinary school and gets a cordon bleu certificate, buys a restaurant instead of developing their own ideas and marketing and opening THEIR OWN restaurant (gee whiz...branding is really HARD!) and then fails miserably at it. Not only failure in keeping decent staff and employer to employee relations, but also secret shoppers and annoying customers who want what they want!

Whose shit that doesn't stink are we talking about again?! I forgot.



Not to sound redundant here...but why are you in the restaurant industry again?!



...especially if you never even try to please them...(cause/effect, i'm pretty sure they can explain this to you over at Wikipedia.)



Decorum...hmmmm, decorum like your trash bloggin' Cordon Bleu ass displays? Let's tally up everything so far...I can see the help wanted ad now...

"Looking for a permanent, hard working, intelligent, non drug-using cook, with the decorum of a chef yet willing to be looked down upon by the real Cordon Bleu chef. Pay is 30% lower than what the other restaurants in town pay, but on the plus side...you don't have to worry about complaints from the customers because we simply don't care about what their grudging ass has to say. Must be willing to prep and do dishes. Must be willing to lose all self respect. Please only committed people apply for this job, once hired please do not ever speak of your commitment to me or you will be banished from my will and beaten with wire hangers. No calls before noon and no calls on even minutes, no calls from cell phones, payphones or jail. (No calls between 12:30pm and 11:30am) No transients, but folks with low or no bills are greatly encouraged to apply!"





Yeah...some people would call it a blessing...or believe that the "Universe" wanted it to happen...other people, they think..."Hmmm self, what the hell am I doing wrong?! Shit is just plain messed up!" I doubt it has anything to do with you?! I doubt none of your problems are occuring because of your actions. Let's regard it as an amazing blessing in disguise or the mystical Universe deciding your life!

Let's all wear pink tutus and run off with the sprites into a pasture to find a leprechaun's pot of gold instead of doing our taxes, paying our utility bills and stopping at red lights!! It's what the UNIVERSE wants me to do!! The UNIVERSE told me to chase rainbows thru the Deschutes National Forest! Going to jail...sitting in the dark, getting t-boned by a semi-truck, it was all one huge BLESSING IN DISGUISE!!!!!

I'll tell you what sounds like a complete and utter miracle. The fact that this woman has run any one single business for an amazing 10 months in a row.

The only thing I wonder is if she really, really, in the depths of her miserable little heart, can honestly tell herself, it was not for a lack of trying?



Again...things you might have thought about, BEFORE YOU BOUGHT A DAMN RESTAURANT!! It would have helped if you had ever worked in one before...or maybe ate in one before? You would have saved yourself the trouble of dealing with these damn people who want to eat!!!



Key word being "great"...you're making people wait 2 hours for food that when they make a suggestion on how it could be better, you write a bitchy blog about them instead and blame them for being "grudgey".



This is a screenshot from the Bloggers very first blog!! It was also her 4th day of ownership! Amazing what running a restaurant for 10 months and 10 days will do to a person. Back then, "the customer comes first, when they want to order, you take their order." to present day...when the whole process is simply a "painful ordeal".

Should have visited the race track and learned a little bit about the jockeys before you bet the farm lady!

I wouldn't worry too much about it though, the UNIVERSE wants you to fail...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

alright, now that i've read this, you've GOT to tell me what restaurant this is or link to the blog!

Brees said...

Aaaah- I love this idea! Oh brilliantly hilarious to dissect someone else's blog-diculousness :) I wanna try..