A Florida restaurant chain says boosting pay and offering better benefits helped it end its labor shortage
Pollo Tropical is raising prices by between 4% and 6% in December to fund its higher wages, sign-on bonuses, and improved benefits.
well who would've thought…
You’d be surprised.
I work as a manager for contract security. Since I’ve joined this company, my accounts have the highest profit across the country.
My accounts have the highest CoL adjusted pay for a given level of security guard.
I keep a veritable dissertation breaking down costs and performance and shit, it’s probably 200 pages long.
Every. Damn. Quarter. I have to send that thing out to some pencil pushing bean counter over at corpo hq - along with the stupid little awards I get for being corpo overlord’s favorite guy.
Because “you’re paying too much in wages and benefits, you should cut back or something.”
Apparently, treating people right is some how… like… novel. It’s hilarious when you show these capitalist bastards that being nice is in fact profitable… how much easier union negotiations are.
(I mean, we’ve practically weaponized the union against other companies. It’s hilarious. The union knows. The local rep was the one that noticed that. Yes, we’d both be shot if it was found out we were catching lunch together.)
And don’t even get me started about that consultants brilliant solution to cutting costs. (One of the line items was to take bullet proof vests away from armed guards. Fuckers,)(okay so my exec may have flown me out to HQ to explain in candid detail why he was a moron. He wanted “eloquent”. Heh.)
I imagine you'll get all sorts of shit from corporate when one of your customers hires one of those pencil pushers. They make the brilliant decision to save money and go with someone else. A year or two later they are back because they got what they paid for.
Company I used to work for got a new CEO who decided that pinching pennies and pushing higher margin useless products was more important than providing quality services and products while paying their employees well.
I got laid off in the first wave. They just completed their 4th consecutive year of layoffs and losing money. Between layoffs and employees jumping ship, they are down over 30% in headcount in 4 years.
The brilliant CEO is "retiring" at the end of the year.
What a revolutionary concept
For the people this article is aimed at, it is a revolutionary concept.
In other news; the USA slowly becoming a modern western nation.
We’ve got this problem at the place I work. I have to cover multiple departments because we’re short-staffed. Management tells me they’re trying to hire someone.
But the job postings are offering less per hour than when I was hired. We’re offering less than McDonalds, and this is a far more complex job.
There’s no reason for anyone to come work for us.
There's also no reason for them to spend more money when you're covering for multiple departments already. They're pocketing the missing person's salary while you do all the work. You need to look for another job or tell your boss that you need more salary to do the additional jobs foisted upon you.
That's crazy, and now in order to remain competitive and get workers, other businesses will also need to raise their pay. Capitalism.
Won't last. Not enough pizza parties and team building exercises like singing and clapping. Do these guys even business?
I'm in a weird spot where I have watched a previous employer of mine slowly collapse due to (among other things) low pay. They wete trying to hire people to pour concrete for $12 per hour. They were trying to hire concrete finishers for $14.
I was fired for dubious and probably illegal reasons from that place, and I didn't care, because I'd already lined up a better job in an attempt to flee a sinking ship. By some weird coincidence, the place I work now is very close to the place I used to work. None of the machines at the old place have moved all summer. The parking lot is almost empty when I drive by on the way home. It's sad, as there were people who worked there who I respected.
Our industries are completely different, but your story reminds me of my own.
I'm a software developer, and I used to work for one of those companies that does everything in its power to convince you they're a great place to work except pay competitive software developer wages. Free snacks! Great onsite gym! Cool, open floorplan! Their turnover was high, they had no clear corporate direction, and they didn't pay what anyone was worth, so there was no loyalty.
I got fired very likely for finding out profits were plummeting and the whole thing was a front for the owner's side-hustle, a Bitcoin mining operation.
These days, it's a shell of its former self, and the few people left who I genuinely liked and respected are all looking for other jobs. I have no doubt the owner will eventually end up in prison.
Thats just crazy enough to work!
People seem to forget that the way Henry Ford was so successful was that he paid more than double the normal rate of that time. He of course didn't do it out of the goodness of his black heart, but it's undoubtedly one of the reasons for his success.
This just in: A Florida man says not hitting himself in the face helped him end his chronic jaw pain. More at eight.
Pollo Tropical is awesome! Good food, good folks, good service. I wish them the best!
This article is 1 year old.