crew member

team member

shift manager

restaurant staff

back of house team member

A&W Restaurants

What is the best part of working at the company?
Strong team work, customer friendships, and enough hours to make money and maintain schooling.

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Rushes, being understaffed at times, running out of supplies due to supplier, angry customers, little work life balance, and insuring everything runs smoothly while busy.

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
You get to know people as you see them all the time and have to work together to achieve the same goal. People are friendly, and some even becoming good friends.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
I come in at 8:30, 2 hours before we open to open the entire store. I ensure that everything is working and that the food is stocked. Next I will set out the tills and count them, and count the safe to ensure the correct amount of money is in there. Lastly, I prepare the cleaning supplies and then open the store. The first hour there is usually only 2 people working, it can get stressful at times when there is an unexpected rush early in the day. Throughout the day I repetitively restock items and clean my space. I often have to direct other people to clean and stock as well while we are still actively getting orders. Every once in a while I will speak face to face with someone or over the phone about a mishap or miscommunication, and will work with them to resolve the issue. More often than not the person is very angry, and I work my best to fix what is wrong. Sometimes it is hard to speak and understand someone who is furious, but you're the only person in the store who can resolve the issue so it's important to remain calm and polite. Sometimes you have to explain to customers that there is no issue that needs fixing, and it's hard to help them understand and that's why phone educate is important, because it's harder to explain a situation to someone if they themselves can't see it in front of them. 
Sometimes I do off the floor work, like cash deposits for the owner and getting change for the safe. I do food safety checklists twice in my shift to monitor the condition of the food we serve. Other times I have to write ups for employees that have already been warned about a behavior that they need to correct, but did not improve on. They aren't that common but they do need to be done sometimes. And after you complete the writing part, you must have a meeting with them to discuss their behavior. Sometimes they don't understand the issue, so you must be patient when explaining it to them; and also strict with implementing the rules. You can't be lenient.
Twice a week I put away the truck orders in the morning. There is some heavy lifting, so it's not to easy to be time efficient with it. 
Every single work day I had out orders to coworkers to make sure they are all busy and helping the store. I monitor that they are following food safety measures and the rules.

A typical day at work consists of greeting customers, taking their orders, making their orders, and calling out their number to their order.  When all of that is finished and our service has died down a bit, I would go and clean up the dining room.  That includes, collecting trays and mugs, wiping down the tables, drink station, and condiment station, as well as sweeping and moping the floors when needed.  If I'm working my evening shift, usually a half hour before my shift ends, I sweep and mop the bathrooms and make sure everything is stocked.  That concludes a complete day at work.  As A&W Long John Silver's being my first job, I had no experience.  But as I continued working there, I learned how to speak to customers properly and work a cashier.  Those were the hardest challenges I had to overcome.  Management is really outstanding and everyone is well trained.  My co-workers and very fun to work with.  We do make jokes and have a few talks but we're still getting our jobs completed at the same time.  The hardest part of the job is when you have picky customers, unhappy customers, and rude customers.  Although they want something their way in particular and there is no way we can fix their problem or there is a confusion, I always handle it the best way I can professionally and if the way I handle it doesn't suit them, then I call a manager so they can help me get through the problems.  The most enjoyable part of the job is when you have happy customers who are really kind and patient.  When you have happy customers that means you're doing a wonderful job.  Making customers happy is the most enjoying part of my job.

The A&W I worked at was privately owned as far as I know, which led the owners to do things that felt unprofessional to me. There was a camera in the back pointed at the grill that would be less used for security and instead to belittle us on not doing well enough. We were scolded if we tried to use paper towels, calling it a waste and reusing the same gross rags over and over again. I did not ever receive proper training for any of my positions, instead received stressful and mismatched information. I never had a consistent position and would be yelled at if I didn't know where I was suppose to be, even though they changed it each day that I came in. I had began to be trained on the front counter, but never was able to even be talked to with the 99 cent coney day rush and was later sent home. Nearing the end of my employment there, they were only giving me three hours a week. Discounts only counted when you were on the clock, and the environment between coworkers always seemed like everyone was cliquey and drama-filled. Not to mention that the owner/manager that would be in for a majority of the time would be late over personal things like buying shoes and would make us clean off snow and unload bags from her car.

The job is easy to catch on to and will usually keep you busy. You are expected to work every station in the resturant while there. Working there was an okay way to make $9 an hour but if you like being happy at work dont be here. The management tries to be friendly and cooperative but will schedule 2 workers and a trainee for the night shift on busy nights while they put 6 people working the morning shift. When brought to their attention they say the will address it but nothing happens. Another big issue is the management is very poor at ordering inventory correctly, so quite often the store would be out of burger patties, fries, cheesecurds and buns. This would happen atleast 2-3 times a week, and then the management expects a crewmember to use their own car and gas to go to walmart to buy more, they even make highschoolers do it too. Easy job ruined by poor management.

What is the best part of working at the company?
The coworkers , the people in worked with on the job were the best part, management needs changed badly

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Lack of job security, knowing that I was going to be fired and replaced with a handful of minors for "cost of labour reduction" really kills the desire to work effectively 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
Coworkers are great, having to sit and watch adult after adult be fired for cost of labour reduction and replaced with untrained minors made for a hostile and unwelcome work environment, add in the lack of proper food safety protocols being followed, fish cooked in chicken /fry oil , cross contamination from assemblers ignoring allergy concerns etc

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Came in, clocked in worked until break having to endure being told to inform the various violations I'd seen going on and to cut corners where possible to shorten serving times

I clock in at work and start with cleaning the counters, the floor and the dishes if they was not done from the last shift. I would then stock the cups, syrups, straws, and anything else we needed stocked. Run the register and take peoples order who came in. If it was my night to car hop I would put my uniform on and get my change from my manager and get to delivering food. I learned responsibilities like knowing what makes customers happy. I also learned how to run the cash register, and learned how to count change back from what they give me. I couldn't ask for better co-workers I loved working there and I loved the people who worked there. The hardest part of the job I would have to say during the summer because it was the busiest all year we would stay late and be running around getting orders and making customers happy. My favorite part of the job was making new friends and having our Christmas parties and any other get together we had.

Managed team of 25-30 crew members. 
● Hired employees and disciplined staff when necessary. 
● Scheduled and directed staff in daily work assignments to maximize productivity. 
● Efficiently resolved problems or concerns to the satisfaction of all involved parties. 
● Continually monitored restaurant and took appropriate action to ensure food quality and service
standards were consistently met. 
● Assigned tasks and oversaw the direction of employees to ensure compliance with food safety
procedures and quality control guidelines. 
● Optimized profits by controlling food, beverage and labor costs on a daily basis. 
● Consistently maintained high levels of cleanliness, organization, storage, and sanitation of food and
beverage products to ensure quality. 
● Carefully prepared Bi-weekly payroll and accounts payable. 
● Regularly updated computer systems with new pricing and daily food specials. 
● Morning and evening paperwork, reports and counting cash register ti

When I would arrive at work I would start by getting ready to help the customers by conducting a food safety check by making sure the food was the correct temperature and the quality of the food was good. I also stocked paper product and other items I needed to make sure my team and I could serve the guest in a fast, friendly manner.

While I was there I learned how to operate a digital reader board, weekly inventory to calculate the food and paper costs, I also learned a lot of other managerial duties that were required of me. The best experience that I gained at my job was how to interact with people from different cultures and it was also the most enjoyable part of my job.

For me the hardest part of my job is when a customer was not satisfied with their experience and there was nothing I could do to remedy the situation.

o A typical day at work for me was to punch in with a time card. Then began cleaning all the mugs, and dishes. Once the customers arrived it was my duty to prepare all drinks, ice-cream sundaes, and shakes.

o I learned on how dealing with food, with it being my first job.

o Management was very cheap, and demanding.

o Hardest part of the job, was refilling the ice-cream on a hot summer day, while making ice-cream sundaes, blizzards, and floats.

o Overall my co-workers were nice, most of them were my family members. The managers were husband & wife and their children worked there as well.

o The hardest part of the job was dealing with the bosses, overly demanding daughter. She felt since she was related to the manager, she could treat the employees any type of way. 

o Enjoyable part of the job was the schedule. Very lenient. Since it was a seasonal job, particularly the summer. You would still have time to enjoy yourself after work.

At A&W the typical work day on Monday through Thursday tended to have the hours between 12 and 2:30 being busy. From 2:30 to 4 we tended to prep. Around  5:30 it tended to get busy till 6:30, die down and then from 8:30 to close it was busy again. Friday through Sunday tended not to have such patterns and you never knew when you were going to be cleaning or cooking. I learned that in order to make a profit on a slow day you sometimes had to send people home early, the internal temp of a patty is 165 and should only take 2 minutes and 30 seconds to get there. The new management has reverted to cooking to order and has put in a new fryer system and a new fry dump. The culture most days is coworkers joking back and forth as we do our jobs and when someone says "Too much" we know to stop. The same coworkers calling in sick is the hardest part of the job. The sense of family and brotherhood with most the coworkers is my favorite part of this job.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Crew member 89 salaries reported	$13.81 per hour
Team member 22 salaries reported	$14.96 per hour
Shift manager 15 salaries reported	$19.13 per hour
Restaurant staff 16 salaries reported	$14.88 per hour
Back of house team member 5 salaries reported	$10.40 per hour

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