Apples to oranges IMO

Different countries have different cost of dining/living etc.

Aggie09Derek said:

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Apples to oranges IMO

Different countries have different cost of dining/living etc.

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That doesn't make sense. Different states, cities, etc. in the US have different costs of dining/living etc.

Yes and in some cities they don't charge corking fees and others charge $15 per bottle.

Just saying you can do nicer dining elsewhere for cheap.

It really isn't apples to oranges. We've just chosen a different system.

The restaurants I'm referring to are the best in town.

What we allow restaurants to charge for liquor and wine is insane.

Why haven't more restaurants gone to a cheaper business model to get more people in to eat?

Say...only 20-30% over cost for a bottle

For a lot of restaurants, the money is really made at the bar. Cutting booze prices would be cutting into their biggest margin contributor.

I definitely agree, just curious what Diggity thinks our restaurants should be doing? Very tough business.

Many have. Look at Charles Clark's restaurants and a'Bouzy. They are selling slightly over retail and still make money somehow.

I refuse to believe that steakhouses have to charge $75 for a $25 bottle of wine (which the customer will end up paying $100 for) in order to turn a profit.

It's an antiquated, expense account, state of mind

Look at all the people scramble to justify their gifting of money to employees of a business. Same exact thing happens in real world discussion on the topic. People tip because they feel guilty not doing so, and use any irrational justification to protect the practice when called out. Social engineering. Very very odd

Diggity said:

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Many have. Look at Charles Clark's restaurants and a'Bouzy. They are selling slightly over retail and still make money somehow.

I refuse to believe that steakhouses have to charge $75 for a $25 bottle of wine (which the customer will end up paying $100 for) in order to turn a profit.

It's an antiquated, expense account, state of mind

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So if they charge less for the drinks they are going to charge more for the food or cheapen the quality of the food. They are going to make their money one way or another...but the general public seems more willing to pay extra for drinks than food so that's where they build in the big cushion.

The difference in what South American and North American countries allow I imagine also has a lot to do with the liquor industry (both regulations as well pricing). If I had to guess a restaurant in the States allowing whiskey or wine to be brought in with no or a low fee probably gets bent over the table by their distributor on pricing.

Bingo

Restaurants have a ton more costs than what is simply on your plate.

Diggity for sure should know how expensive Houston real estate and property taxes are.

claym711 said:

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Look at all the people scramble to justify their gifting of money to employees of a business. Same exact thing happens in real world discussion on the topic. People tip because they feel guilty not doing so, and use any irrational justification to protect the practice when called out. Social engineering. Very very odd

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Last time I'll ask....

Would you rather your food be 20-30% more and no tip at all?

Aggie09Derek said:

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claym711 said:

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Look at all the people scramble to justify their gifting of money to employees of a business. Same exact thing happens in real world discussion on the topic. People tip because they feel guilty not doing so, and use any irrational justification to protect the practice when called out. Social engineering. Very very odd

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Last time I'll ask....

Would you rather your food be 20-30% more and no tip at all?

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From a quick search, it looks like a recent survey by Zagat showed the average American tipped 18%. Given that, why would food costs have to adjust by 20-30%?

Because we all know that not all those tips are being claimed on taxes (so net payment to waiter would be the same - 30% was obviously a little high). Let's not act like all these waiters are making tons and tons of money.

How about 18-25% added onto your bill?

Not the case at his restaurants so I don't know what his magical formula is.

You guys all seem fine with getting bent over for booze so no need to change anything.

So your justification for tipping is that if you didn't, they would charge you 20-30% more for food?

Have you tested this theory? Try it out tonight.

claym711 said:

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So your justification for tipping is that if you didn't, they would charge you 20-30% more for food?

Have you tested this theory? Try it out tonight.

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I don't think that is what he's saying.

He's saying that if restaurants did away with the idea of tipping, they would adjust food up to cover the difference. I think he's right, just not sure I buy the specific 20-30% numbers.

I think we all agree if you want to personally refuse to tip while knowing the servers aren't making minimum wage, nobody will increase the price of your food.

claym711 said:

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So your justification for tipping is that if you didn't, they would charge you 20-30% more for food?

Have you tested this theory? Try it out tonight.

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If everyone didn't tip...then yes.

No, I'm not gonna try it out tonight and be some *******.

I tip 20% for the most part

Below average service gets 15% and exception service (and price is lower) I'll tip 25%.

Quote:

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No, I'm not gonna try it out tonight and be some *******.

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Exactly my point. People tip because they are insecure about not doing so.

One of the more odd things we have been socialized to do.

claym711 said:

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Quote:

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No, I'm not gonna try it out tonight and be some *******.

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Exactly my point. People tip because they are insecure about not doing so.

One of the more odd things we have been socialized to do.

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And my point is that if everyone didn't tip then they would be charging us 20%+ more on the bill. That's fine but I would expect service to go down slightly.

62strat said:

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Tecolote said:

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claym711 said:

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Willingly supplementing employment costs is one of the more odd things that American capitalists have been guilted into doing.

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Also, the waitress at the diner with $7 burgers works just as hard as the one at a place selling $40 plates.

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A realtor in Kansas works just as hard a one in NYC doesn't he?

What point are you trying to make?

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A realtor in SF has to do about 1/100th of the work of a realtor in Kansas but gets 10-20 times the commission.

I tip 15% minimum on my part of the transaction, it's an implied fee for service. Anything above that is for good service. I always made $2.13 an hour as a waiter, so I needed $3-4 per hour to make minimum wage. I almost always had 1-2 hours a shift with no tips, either doing prep work (filling ramekins, prepping other table accompaniments, filling ice, stocking the bar, ect) so I really needed $6-8 per hour in tips. Many high end places are going non tip and shifting the cost to the food. Good waiters are leaving those places so instead they are cross training cooks, waitstaff, bar and host staff as a way to keep people. However, waiting tables is tough for an equadorian line cook. All that being said I tip over 15% most of the time because I appreciate the work that goes into, appreciate mastery of their craft and realize that service person is likely less fortunate than I.

You can also try out your non tipping theory and your price won't go up. You will just be taking part in the welfare system. You will get the value that the rest of us cover with our tips or you will be taking it out of the servers pocket and putting it into yours. One person can decide not to pay their taxes and it will have little effect on the system as a whole. There is an episode of the podcast "the 4 top" that debates this concept it was very interesting

Person makes $3/hr and depends on you to give them money to make up the difference. Business doesn't make enough to pay employees and depends on you to pay their employees under the guise of an 'implied fee'.

Sounds like it's you who's participating in a welfare system.

The person makes 2.13 per hour plus tips. Without the tips the waiter/waitress/waitperson wouldn't work there but enjoy the service the rest of us paid for!

claym711 said:

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Person makes $3/hr and depends on you to give them money to make up the difference. Business doesn't make enough to pay employees and depends on you to pay their employees under the guise of an 'implied fee'.

Sounds like it's you who's participating in a welfare system.

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This is what is so amazing at everyone who adamantly defends tips for the waiter as being the only model. Grew up in a family owned business that provides hard goods and very customer service oriented. Customers have everything loaded onto their trucks by our crew. We don't pay $3/hr and then look at the customer and expect them to tip the crew. And this is heavy lifting, hard, manual labor.

I'm not expecting the US restaraunt tipping method to change anytime soon (or ever) and it doesn't bother me. However, saying any other method would always result in poorer service isn't true - or outrageous prices. Our crews work damn hard and are always complimented on the great service they provide. If a restaurant includes service and you have a problem then take it to the manager - just like in our business, an employee underperforming or receiving lots of complaints isn't employed by us very long.

I agree other methods could work but it's not the way it works here. I will say service in the UK, Paris, Croatia,Slovenia and Romania is not on par with our service. Granted a lot of the food in the UK sucks. Now in Japan service is exceptional and they also don't rely on tips. However, not tipping in our current system takes money that is relied upon out of the pocket of working people.

I will say that the credit card option to tip is something that has made tipping an option at places where I normally would have just said keep the change. I wish there was an option to keep the change on a credit card tip rather than having to hit other

claym711 said:

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Person makes $3/hr and depends on you to give them money to make up the difference. Business doesn't make enough to pay employees and depends on you to pay their employees under the guise of an 'implied fee'.

Sounds like it's you who's participating in a welfare system. wait staff makes $2.13/hour because that's all the business can afford to pay. I mean I guess you can but it will make me wonder why someone with such a bad understanding of basic business is spending time on the business board.

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Edit: I apologize for the harsh start. Long first day back. Business don't pay $2.13 to their wait staff because it's all they can afford. The post I quoted here doesn't demonstrate any real understanding of the facts surrounding this debate. Let me fix that. This entire next paragraph is facts, no opinions here. We have to have a minimum level of understanding to have an intelligent conversation.

Minimum wage is $7.25/hour. Being a waiter doesn't change that. The business must guarantee $7.25/hour to all employees, wait staff included. Only service businesses that allow customers to pay tips directly to their server may reduce the hourly rate for those employees by up to $5.12/hour. Let me say that again. It's not that minimum wage for wait staff is $2.13, it's that you can discount up to $5.12 off of minimum for wait staff. If any person on your wait staff does not earn sufficient tip income to reach $7.25/hour the business must pay the difference in what is referred to as make up tips. Further if you work overtime as a waiter you don't get $3.20 ($2.13 x 1.5) for those hours but rather $5.76 (($7.25 x 1.5)-$5.13).

This really isn't difficult and it baffles me that so many folks don't get it. The American economy is geared to reward hard work, innovation and great service. That's true in all industries, not just restaurants. If the average tip is 15% and you eliminate tips it's a 100% guarantee that the price on the menu will go up 15% to cover the higher fixed wage the business is now paying to it's wait staff. That's not really up for debate. There is no business in the country that is going to have an increase of $5.13/hour for half of it's employees without raising prices. What's also likely to happen is that the quality of service will go down. Wait staff don't make $7.25/hour. The lowest ones I see from my clients make about $10/hour but you can bet your ass that if you force restaurants to cover the cost without tips you're going to see wait staff hiring on at $8/hour and having to work 2+ years to reach the $10/hour level they can make now by earning tips.

Why on earth anyone thinks eliminating reward based compensation is going to have a good result I'll never understand.

Because it really is a ridiculous rewards based compensation plan that is different from other sales or commission type plans.

What other commission based sales plan allows the customer to decide the % pay the sales person received AFTER the product is used?

What other incentive based program has the person who collects the revenue decide how to reward the producers and other service people who help deliver the product?

Again, to make it closer to all other commission system, the "tip" should already be a rolled into the price so the server is guaranteed the reward for the service.

Iowaggie said:

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Because it really is a ridiculous rewards based compensation plan that is different from other sales or commission type plans.

What other commission based sales plan allows the customer to decide the % pay the sales person received AFTER the product is used?

What other incentive based program has the person who collects the revenue decide how to reward the producers and other service people who help deliver the product?

Again, to make it closer to all other commission system, the "tip" should already be a rolled into the price so the server is guaranteed the reward for the service.

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That's a matter of preference but I get your point. My counter would be that there's more than one way to skin a cat. I don't find it the least bit ridiculous. I know it's not exactly like commission but the concepts aren't entirely different. My biggest frustration with this thread is that people actually believe $2.13 is somehow the wage because that's all the business can afford which is just factually inaccurate and demonstrates a lack of understanding of the basics of business and employment law. All I really want us to do is discuss whether tipping is a good system without the distraction of posts that ridicule the system based on a lack of understanding of how it works.

I wish more services used this model. If I could pay my electrician a flat fee then a percentage based on quality Id be all in on that

Keeper of The Spirits said:

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I wish more services used this model. If I could pay my electrician a flat fee then a percentage based on quality Id be all in on that

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How would you evaluate how good of a job he did? There's a level of expertise that comes with being an electrician that I don't expect of my waiter. Having said that there's nothing to keep you from giving that guy a tip. Kind of like those that say taxes should be raised, there's nothing to prevent you from paying more.

To start was he/she:

On time
Professional
Work quickly
Clean up their mess
Work product look clean


I do tip the yard guy, the maid, dog sitter and a few other service professionals that help me who I pay in cash. If the electrician has a tip line I'd consider it

So many words to justify, rationalize, and minimize corporate welfare. Keep paying those employment costs. Restaurants appreciate your insecurity.