Kokoangyo

I saw on your website that you have decided to make your restaurant gratuity free. How do you handle that with your staff? Do you pay a high hourly wage, or is gratuity factored into the cost and divided based on how many tickets you sell for your events? Do you find it difficult to staff at all?

I understand completely if you don't want to discuss, but I live in the central Florida area, and have worked in restaurants at all levels in most positions. What do you consider a fair wage/industry standard for servers or bartenders?

While I agree that people with different skillets and responsibilities shouldn't necessarily be the same, I'm just curious about the actual level of compensation you offer. As was pointed out earlier, work in a restaurant can be a great source of income, and even 20$ an hour is a relatively low wage for most servers. Having looked at some of your sample menus I feel like your service staff should have a relatively strong grasp of food and wine in order to ensure a great guest experience. Central Florida also has a fairly high cost of living, with rent for 1 bed 1 bath apartments frequently sitting around 800-1000 a month. With all of those factors, how do you determine a base line wage? And how do you convince staff to stay when a standard tip model generally yields higher personal income? Do you offer benefits that aren't normally found in restaurants, or do you generally employ newcomers to the industry?