Meet Glass, Lewis and Co., the company that got a food truck employee fired for offending them on Twitter

Yeah, if you’re in the center states, the big box stores and chain restaurants are killing it right now, and hardly anyone is putting up a fight. Almost 30 years ago, they were concerned about the effects of the “brain drain” (smart graduates growing up and leaving the state), and now we’re seeing the result.

Actually, as a former (horribly paid) food service worker, and long-time member of the low-ish classes, my take on this incident/response has been fairly similar to NickyG’s.

Guess I’ll shuffle off to my under-bridge lair, then.

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Restaurant workers are not a homogenous group. Besides generally being bitter bastards :wink:

I spent quite a long time in that industry, and would typically jump to the support of any ill-treated fellow kitchen-monkey. This guy? Nah. Have you read his original linked article/post? He pretty clearly didn’t want to keep his job, but now wants to get credit for losing it. Can’t really have it both ways, IMO.

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“I think they call this concern trolling.”

You think wrong. The use of the word “trolling” has been completely bastardized to the point that any post that one’s in disagreement with gets so labeled. Ditto with tacking “concern” on as a prefix. That’s not what trolling is. Please stop contributing to the misuse of the word.

And the person that cooks your food at a restaurant doesn’t deserve your tip? The person who checks out your groceries doesn’t deserve your tip? By the same logic, you are one cheap person for not giving money to everyone who serves you in any capacity as part of their job.

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This is a weird situation, and no one comes out looking very good.

  1. Food truck operator, apparently relying solely on social media feedback to judge the performance of staff? How the hell can you punish someone for the color of food in an instagram photo, anyway (the whole point of that format is stylized, inaccurate color)?!? I’ve worked for owners who were over-reliant on comment cards, and it’s hellish. Most of that sort of feedback is, by definition, negative. And contradictory! Weee.
  2. Big shot masters-of-the-universe types who overreact to a negative mention on twitter, and apparently pressure an employer to fire the offending twit? Ugh.
  3. Seemingly entitled little whiner who deliberately sabotages his employment and then complains about the consequences? Where’s my violin? (Can’t find it, 'cause in this case it’s microscopic…)

Look. I don’t want to get in to the tipping debate (suffice it to say that I’m a default twenty-percenter). But the social requirement to tip in non-waitstaff situations is not firmly established in the US, and certainly not in the relatively new arena of food trucks. The mere presence of a tip jar is not a reliable indicator that the workers actually need said tips to build a full paycheck. I worked in a coffee bar setting for a minute, and although the wages weren’t excellent the jar was just gravy at the end of the day. Furthermore, many, many restaurants discourage tip-sharing between the kitchen staff and the waitstaff. I worked at a place that was one of the classier joints in my town, but paid the cooks for crap (I was only at eight-odd bucks after several years of excellent work, and even the head chef only pulled down about $25/hr.). But the waitstaff routinely walked with $300 – $500 a night, and only tipped out the kitchen on extremely rare occasions (usually due to specific customer direction). In a situation – like a truck – where the staff both takes and fires orders, things can get murky. I mean, do you tip your diner cook? Probably not, even though he/she might engage with you (including handing over your food!) at least as much as the server (who you do tip).

Dude clearly doesn’t understand the basics of food service. “The business practice of running a restaurant is to cultivate great customers and spurn bad ones,” he says. Um, no. The business of a restaurant is serving f*cking food to people, whether great or bad. At least in this reality.

I get that the whole social media angle really complicates things. The owner put himself at risk by building it so heavily into the business model, for sure, and I join many here in sort of relishing his miscalculation (as well as noting the lack of class on the part of G,L & Co.). But for an employee to go so specifically public about a “bad” customer is just not acceptable. Would it be okay to take out an ad in the local paper, badmouthing an otherwise lucrative customer who tipped poorly? Maybe from some sort of abstract social justice perspective, but not from a business one. Immediate termination.

Termination, we need to understand, that the employee fully admits he anticipated and had the luxury to afford. So, yay for him (I wonder how his former comrades are enjoying the increased scrutiny and pressure from above?). I think it’s safe to say that those decrying class oppression are barking up the wrong tree, at least this time. (And I assure you, as a 12+ year veteran of that scene, I’d normally join in.)

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Wait, how the Hell did this story suddenly get 155 comments?

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Regardless of how you feel about Wall Street, food trucks, tipping protocol or Twitter, can we all agree that the headline for the BB story is plain inaccurate?

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I love the many ways that cheapskates try to justify stiffing people whose livelihoods depend on tips. They’re just so… so… cheap!

If you run a business and expect tips, put up a sign or a jar indicating that tips are appreciated.
The general public isn’t supplied a list of places where they are expected to tip. That’s on the business owner.

  1. I overtip. I like to overtip. I feel good, despite generally being an awful person, and I get great service. Plus it leads to fun observable results. I had a favorite Chinese delivery place right out of law school, and I overtipped, and the delivery guy would bring free food the next time, and I would overtip more, and he would bring more free food, and so forth, until I moved away before the theoretical zero-point when he was bringing me ALL THE CHINESE FOOD and I was giving him all my money.

  2. Dickishness is not a zero-sum game.

  3. An argument can be made that tip-shaming is dickish.

  4. However, even if tip-shaming is dickish, a disproportionate response is dickish. A non-disproportionate-response might be a response tweet “hey, if you eat at @foodcart, and they don’t like your tip, they may tip-shame you. Act accordingly.” Calling up the employer and whining is disproportionately dickish and sensitive.

  5. Also it’s stupid and likely to have this reputation-catastrophic result.

  6. Not tipping on a $170 order that takes over the whole food truck is highly dickish.

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“Why are you taking all our food to one guy?”

“He keeps overpaying and I feel guilty!”

“I just can’t figure out how you got three hundred egg rolls in that basket. Wait, duck sauce comes in gallons?”

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Are you serious? A “convenience” that I barely “deserve”? It’s called commerce… you know, exchanging money for goods and services? It makes the world go 'round. And I’m supposed to be wracked with guilt for engaging in a basic commercial transaction?

I support labor reform probably as much as most of the people here, but I’m not going to prop up a broken system by indulging what is basically institutionalized pan-handling.

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Ah, one of those idealists whose principled stance just happens to coincide with the path of greatest personal convenience. Kind of like those people who think that staying home on election day makes them Patrick Freakin’ Henry because they aren’t “legitimizing a rigged system.”

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“The food here is awful!”

“And the portions are so small!”

/borscht_belt

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It’s funny but it’s also true. If I’m paying $28 for a hunk of shit it had better be a BIG hunk of shit. :wink:

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Well, there aren’t many +100-year-old jokes that still get a laugh. Those that do generally reflect some kind of universal truth. I’m pretty sure this joke is translated from the original Yiddish and arrived in the summer resorts of upstate New York via Renaissance Europe. Although who knows? Maybe they were telling this joke in Aleppo 1500 years ago.

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[> The ratio of CEO-to-worker pay has increased 1,000 percent since 1950, according to data from Bloomberg. Today Fortune 500 CEOs make 204 times regular workers on average, Bloomberg found. The ratio is up from 120-to-1 in 2000, 42-to-1 in 1980 and 20-to-1 in 1950.][1]

Square the circle by having the CEO’s and their ilk capture a reasonable portion of the company earnings instead of this netting this obscene imbalance. (btw- the 50’s are the Golden Age in many a conservative’s business man’s mind. Logic ends where unfettered greed begins.)

(edit: source of quote)
[1]: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/30/ceo-to-worker-pay-ratio_n_3184623.html

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I certainly don’t remember skewing it as “barely”. Flat out, it’s a convenience. People performing the additional service of cooking the food they sell you.

edit: Oh, and if it’s a restaurant, providing plates and utensils if needed and cleaning up after you leave.

Yes, but the price of the food reflects the cost of preparing, cooking and serving it (including wages for the people doing this, the most important part), plus a profit for the restaurant owner. Or should do.

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