Recycled Story: Quitting The Radisson After One Day*

I know - one day. But…

Things I wish I had known before I applied:
- On average, breakfast servers only make $35 in tips for an 7-8 hour shift - and that’s the busiest time of day.
- A “busy” day consists of 35 tables in the entire shift.
- Most tips are only 10% on a $10-20 bill. You do the math.
- Asking guests if everything is okay more than once is considered harassing them.
- Being a waitress also means being a hostess, cashier, busboy, cook, and room service runner.
- There is so little organization that the tables aren’t even numbered and they don’t require their servers to learn the menu.
- “Good service” is not being polite, friendly, and welcoming - it’s being invisible.

So, yeah. I feel kind of bad quitting after a day, but that’s only because they’re pretty nice people there. But, oh well. It was a waste of time and definitely not worth getting up at 4:30 in the morning for.

The Radisson markets itself as an upscale hotel, but it’s all fake… Once you get behind the scenes, out of the public areas, it’s obvious that the management needs to seriously assess that situation. The kitchen is huge, but so open and empty…They don’t do enough business to keep it totally stocked (except for banquets and such, I’m guessing). The walls have huge stains on them, the wallpaper is old and faded, it seemed like everything was dirty, some of their cloth napkins have holes in them…It’s fake luxury. It’s all about appearances there. “We’ll set our tables and people will think we’re high-end, so they’ll pay $7 for a continental breakfast.” Sadly, it seems to work - although apparently not THAT well, considering how slow they are.

*Full disclosure: I originally wrote this in June 2007, when my brief stint at the hotel actually occurred.