When Replaceable Restaurant Workers Become Irreplaceable

Photo by Brian Lundquist via Unsplash

Anybody who has ever worked in restaurants has surely heard the phrase “Everyone is replaceable” by an owner or manager. 

In an article written by Holly Letch, recently shared in the Vittles Newsletter, called “You are not replaceable,” Letch describes her experience being forced to work at her restaurant job on furlough, while her boss reminded her that she was “lucky to have a job” during the pandemic.

No one can deny that COVID has been especially brutal for restaurant owners. The labor shortage, which reached an all-time high this summer, has forced many of them to close their restaurants either temporarily or permanently, drastically reduce store hours and overwork themselves and their remaining staff. 

Last year, restaurant workers worldwide had time to think and reassess their lives while they were hanging out on furlough or unemployment. They were burned out and their jobs – notoriously low paying with unreliable and/or long hours – were the source. The pandemic underscored a need for these workers to seek financial security, and for some, better working conditions. 

Letch posed the question, “​​If the industry placed more social and economic value on the employee, would workforces be more resilient during turbulent times?”

Restaurant owners now compete for staff by increasing wages, finding it near impossible to replace their once “replaceable” staff. 

"The idea of transience within the hospitality industry, where staff can be easily ‘replaced’,” Letch said, “has long been a self-fulfilling prophecy: a revolving door of prospects and an assumption that new bodies can be easily found at the same price. But introduce a pandemic, the industry finds itself in turmoil.” 

The question then becomes, not “How do we find staff?” but “How do we fix the industry?”

In a sense, “How do we make the hospitality industry more hospitable?” Not for its guests, but for its workers, in order to incentivize them to come back. 

In July, BBC News published an article titled “Is there a solution to the hospitality staff crisis?”

The article shared that the one in five workers who left the industry during the pandemic left because of the industry itself. One source in Manchester said that workers who left the industry during COVID realized they could find better-paying jobs with fewer hours in other industries.

It also posited that while this may explain most of the reason for hospitality labor shortage it is also due to the fact that the entire economy reopened at the same time thus creating a mad rush to hire staff. 

While it may feel right to side with the workers, this crisis really hurts us all, from the restaurant owner to the diner. Something to keep in mind next time you go out to eat.