08/11/2020
So many local businesses are struggling right now. Shop local and keep these places going.
It’s Monday.
I’ve lived though some crazy times in my life. I remember when 9/11 hit, and feeling unsure what the hell was going on, and whether we would all “make it”.
Then the “Great Recession” hit and those were some lean years. The last 10 years have been a blast as everybody seemed like they were rolling in prosperity.
Tonight was the first night in close to 20 years we closed because we are so short staffed that we didn’t have anyone to open the place. Business is still good enough but far from normal.
When Corona hit we had 6 employees working for me with 64 years of combined service, that is unheard of. Post Corona we only got back 2 of them.
It’s strange because the job market for finding employees for the restaurant business is not there. It’s so difficult to run a place with temporary employees who are not doing this as a profession and we hope things get back to normal.
The biggest frustration is that I get lots of moms trying to get their 18 year old sons a job and that’s not how this business works (exactly). We don’t want a mom getting a job for a kid that doesn’t want a job, but we do want the 18 year old kid who has the courage to walk in and ask for a job!
Professional Bar People make crazy money in our business and it’s still not understood that these are very, very high paying jobs that require as they say “a certain set of skills.” Whenever I put stuff up on pay you will get people saying crazy stuff like; “who wants to make $2.13 an hour!” Mam, no one in “this world” is making $2.13 an hour, that is not even legal.
I have enlisted my wife and my daughter with a Masters Degree to help me run the place and we are plum tired of working 7 days a week.
I am at the stage of this business where it is my desire to keep this place going without having to sell it where it would become yet another Bougie or Trendy spot with a short life span.
Bars like MacCracken’s technically don’t go out of business, the owner retires or dies and the families sell these places because the real estate is valuable. We are trying to get our daughter interested enough to at least give it a try.
Tonight we went over to the Bar to put up an order and a lovely Bartender from a neighboring restaurant came in while we were closed, and we we were talking about the crazy times we are in. We decided that this business rewards people for just showing up and if you have skills it rewards you aptly. She is above average and they are lucky to have her at that other restaurant.
Our role in the “Marietta Food Chain” is to be that Bar where you can say; “ya, my dad came in here”, or “we celebrated here after our wedding”, or sadly; “we came here after we buried my father.”
I took some detours to get here but my first job was a dishwasher at Steak & Ale when I was 15 years old. My mom let me take the job and dropped me off after high school and picked me up at 11-12 midnight a few nights a week so I could get abused in the “back of the house”. That would be called a “right of passage” or a character builder. My mom had waitressed and worked in a prestigious French restaurant making $200 a night in the 1940’s. She also worked in a high volume diner. She did this to help my dad open his business while raising 4 children.
I remember lying about being experienced as a waiter after busing tables to get my first waiter job. I remember the night I lit some guys tie on fire doing a flambé table-side at a place I was not qualified to work at. I also remember telling the chef he burned my customers steak and he pulled a knife on me. Then after my first corporate job, I took a job prepping in a kitchen for $5 bucks an hour do I could learn how the big restaurants operated.
I remember we worked alongside immigrants, gay, le***an, every type of person and thinking how open minded our industry was.
I hate to use the word “blessed” because honestly it would be cool to run a hot dog stand at Mexico Beach right now with the ocean as a backdrop, but that’s probably not going to happen.
In the meantime, we are doing ok, just want things to get normal again and rebuild our staff.
Come see me for lunch tomorrow, I’ll be waiting tables.
