cook

restaurant manager

server

host/hostess

general manager

Dennys

Working at Dennys for months now, I've gotten accustomed to the workplace, the coworkers and the overall environment. It's a standard minimum wage job, it's not hard once you know the ins and outs of the place. You can make some decent money both as a cook and a server. Some days are easier than others, the coworkers are nice, easy to talk to and are reliable, the menu is fairly easy to remember and most of it is really chill.

I say most of it because management constantly hounds employees to upsale, charge and push every sale we can. Which wouldn't be out of the ordinary if it wasn't for the fact that they've threatened our jobs on multiple occasions if we don't sell what they deem acceptable. They've also held google reviews over our heads and have reamed the team more than once for not getting enough good reviews. It doesn't matter how good of an employee you are or how much your liked by your peers or the customers, you'll be thrown to the sharks if you aren't constantly reaching their standards, even on slow days. 

Management refuses to hire any food runners and don't have any hosts over the weekend, so on busy days, you're being pulled back and forth constantly between taking drinks, making milkshakes, delivering the food, taking orders from a table across the lobby and in charge of seating customers on top of it without proper help most of the time which makes it much more stressful for employees than it needs to be and if you aren't timely enough with everything, you will absolutely be reprimanded.

Management and higher ups have also been disrespectful to the team and have told staff that we're replaceable, have kicked out employees mid rush hour off the property and told an employee to not come back when he attempted to put in his two weeks, yelled at another employee after she requested to be off the floor after nearly 8 hours of work but demand that we respect their authority which creates an uncomfortable work dynamic between management and employees. Almost a hostile one at that. They've also been known to play favorites and have allowed other, older employees to show up hours later to work consistently and even allow employees to allow homeless people inside while newer employees have been written up for showing up 30 minutes late. This is has been an ongoing situation for months now and no action has been taken yet.

Overall, while it's greatly possible that you'll meet great people here and find yourself a solid team, BUT you're also likely to find yourself heaving a lot more workload than expected and facing a lot of stresses from management and higher ups that you probably wouldn't face in any other serving/cooking career. This particular dennys shouldn't be your first choice, maybe not even your second, there's plenty of other jobs waiting to be snatched up in the area.

I worked at the store in Clovis, NM. 
In honesty, other stores may be different, but to sum it up:
This place was a joke.
This location has struggled for the last several years, and I can see why;
1. Management has no local knowledge.
They want to blame the employees for the lack of sales, especially on second and third shift, but this is due to the fact that they have absolutely no knowledge of the local area. This is a city where ninety percent of people work first shift. so business late at night is automatically going to be slow. This store is also located on the very edge of town, a poor location for a twenty four business.
2. Management treats employees like they are incompetent.
Tying into the fact of lack of local knowledge, management refuses to acknowledge the fact that this is an extremely poor area, and many "customers" will lie to get food for free. No matter the situation, the employee is always wrong, and treated as such.
3. Management spies on employees.
They keep a camera on you at all times, which is standard now in many places, but it goes a step further- they will track what you say and do on social media.
4. Rules are never fairly enforced.
If the store manager likes you, you can show up to work late whenever you want, do a poor job, leave early, etc.
If they do not like you, you will be criticized for every single thing that you do. 
If you say anything about the people they like, then you are blamed, and told to not say your mouth.
5. Random meetings are criticism sessions.
The store manager likes to call store meetings about once a month, which are hour long sessions where all employees are criticized, blamed, and given orders. These are not meetings, so much as verbal punishment sessions. No allowance is made for the fact that some people work overnight.
6. Expected to work on breaks.
If you work overnight, you are required to work on your break.
7. Pay system is complicated.
You are forced to accept the pay card, even if you have a bank account, and it is impossible to get an accurate knowledge of your actual pay. Furthermore, if you are a tipped employee, you may be forced to leave at a certain time- and forced to transfer your ticket to someone else, after you have done all the work.
8. Management forces employees to violate health codes.
Food is routinely "re-labeled", even if it is expired.
9. Slow business means low pay for tipped employees.
10. Tipped employees are forced to do non tipped functions (such as phone orders).
11. The company keeps the tips from online orders.
12. Management criticizes people for their physical appearance and accents.
13. Large numbers of customers are rude people trying to get something for free.

Many factors play into the fact that this Denny's in particular struggle in many areas. Some area's more than others. Some are out of your control, some are simply because change is hard to accept or maintain. I've learned that being in a restaurant business you must have a balance persona about it when accepting the position. As is all jobs, love what you do and the money will follow. You must love being hospitable, appreciate the people who you employ on a daily basis, care and make a difference to your customers and staff because you may never know what story each of them have when they walk into your restaurant. I can go on, but that might have to be saved for a longer page. 
The hardest part of my job that i have encountered would be the system that roots to the CEO founders of the Dennys franchise. You can be boiling in quicksand and scream for their help but instead of helping, they shake their finger at you and explain how you deserved it. Their justification is short of nothing, shrugging off the small fish like bottom feeders. I've never felt so helpless being employed here and instead of possibly costing everyone's job by not proposing an investigation, I thought it best for me to leave after multiple attempts to get aid. 
The best part about my job was making a difference with every customer that walked through my door. Food is love and when you share it with others it's an amazing feeling. You just feel good to know that you made a difference when you are sincerely taking care of your customers when they bring their partners or family to eat. They are trusting you to feed and service them the best way possible for an hour, almost like a blind date. Of course, that is only half of it. The other half of my enjoyment would be the people I delegate 10-12 hours a day, everyday. I am not friends with my co-workers, but I care for them immensely. Do you not care and maintain your car when it takes you everywhere to do your job? When the paint starts to peel or the engine starts to smoke do you simply just toss it away and buy another one without trying to repair it? I lead my coworkers hand in hand on a daily basis to ensure them that they are never alone. 
This review may be a bit much, but I feel so strong about this place that I would be guilty if I kept it short. I would go further into the problems but, it is more complex than you would ever believe. I do wish this Denny's a fruitful future because it supplies many with jobs and favorable destinations for the locals, but if the franchise allows it to go on like it is they will only be waiting for the inevitable.

Overall the job itself isn't terrible, but with incredibly high turn-over rates (like 1 out of 20 employees might stay for a full year) and the customer base that the company caters to, the clear skew towards first shift (at the great expense of the other shifts), and the grueling workload that's expected of the staff, there are just too many factors contributing to burn-out.

I've never been afraid of hard work or a challenge, but we often tell new hires that this job will make them or break them, and frequently, people have trouble staying for even a month.  Servers are expected to do too much (everything) with too little support (none, unless manager is miraculously not trapped in the kitchen), the kitchen is often expected to accomplish all cooking and prep with only one cook through the week and even weekend dinner hours (which is why managers can seldom leave BoH).

Friday & Saturday nights?  Both 2nd and 3rd shift run with one cook while Sunday and Saturday /mornings/ run with up to four--and these are company standards!  The workload for all is absurd.

I worked 70+ hours as a shift manager during Thanksgiving week--which is fine by itself, I understand the responsibility of management--and about 58 hours the week before.  So with over 30 hours of overtime on my paycheck, I was excited.  What I had not accounted for, was the company automatically pays out remaining vacation hours that same week (this is standard and I suppose I should have anticipated this better).

Because corporate doesn't seem to have any system in place to protect its overworked employees, the EIGHTY HOURS of vacation pay that I would have received--in conjunction with /thirty hours/ of overtime--pushed me into the next tax bracket, resulting in a total loss of ALL of my vacation pay going to taxes.  80 hours of vacation?  Gone.  80 hours of pay?  Gone.  Why?  Because I worked too hard for the company over the holidays--which yes, includes working ten or twelve hours ON those holidays.

That was really the deal-breaker for me.  I gave the company my time, and they gave my payout to the government.

Work hard with too many tasks?  Sure.
Work two 20hr doubles in the same weekend (this wasn't even during the holiday season)?  Why not?!
Manage the restaurant by yourself for $0.25 more than a sloppy cook?  The best!

But what a slap in the face to ignore your employees working at the ground level to make YOUR money while you sit at home with family, and give their vacation earnings TO THE GOVERNMENT.

Indeed... America's Diner!

A typical day at Denny’s was by no means boring. It wasn’t uncommon that we would be frighteningly understaffed for weeks on end; the restaurant only had two managers running the place anyway. Days were challenging as a server trying to keep up with all the tables. Ordinary in restaurants servers are assigned a section of tables that they will be responsible for, however we didn’t do that much. Whenever we saw a table we would always try our best to take it, just to make sure everyone was getting waited on. Sadly, sometimes we just couldn’t keep up and there were people who never got served. It wasn’t uncommon for a server to take care of twelve tables all at once, and this can be very overwhelming. I’ve heard from severs of other restaurants that they usually take care of about four tables at once, meaning this job was a bit more stressful than other others. Servers weren’t the only ones under pressure either; the poor kitchen was full of new, inexperienced cooks and was still understaffed too. Whenever it got like this it became obvious that the food was going to come out slow. The kitchen would frequently push food out after 50 minutes to an hour and a half. There was also this rule that we weren’t allowed to have people wait unless every table was occupied. These days became so intense; however they taught me so much. They made me into a better server and taught me how to manage my time in the most effective way possible. My co-workers at Denny's became a large part of my life when I started this job. I would spend around 50 hours a week working and this gave me a significant amount of my time with them. I had gained strong relationships with everyone and we all loved working with one another. We were always able to maintain professional relationships with one another too; keeping Denny's a positive environment to work in. My managers worked really hard in trying to improve conditions at Denny’s, however there were only two of them. They needed help and knew it. However, the district manager never found anyone for the spot. My favorite part of working at this restaurant was having the opportunity to get to meet new people daily while waiting on tables. I enjoyed getting to know their unique stories, especially ones who were just traveling through the area. My least favorite thing about this job was how understaffed we were. We didn’t even have enough dishwashers and this is a 24 hour restaurant.

At first upon getting the server position i was beyond excited and ready to hit the ground running. The Dennys that hired me was just  opening in my area and was super excited to be apart of the team whom was apart of that whole process of opening a brand new restaurant. Upon opening and few months in every was okay for the most part tips were amazing business was booming life was peachy. But after being there for almost year is where i lost the love for my work and making customers smile everyday while meeting meeting new people and getting to interact with them thats what i loved most and one of the main reasons i stuck with the customer service/hospitality industry for so many years. After a year of me being there just seemed like crew morale was non existent managers barely treated employees with an ounce of respect anymore . Managers there were not experienced in a extremely fast paced business and able to handle all the ups and downs of what being a manger entailed. Some of the managers were more worried if they were friends with the.employees are not then being an actual manager and doing.all the tasks and duties good or bad that came along with their position. Extremely unprofessional when dealing with the employees aspect. Now with managers and dealing with the customers there they were amazing i give em that! So obviously with unprofessional and managers whom have no ounce of respect for the employees cane came with being short handed literally all the time and i mean all the time even over peak business hours. They couldn't keep employees the employees turn over rate was extremely high! Would be lucky if a new hire came back.after there first day its sad to say but 100 percent truthful. I worked many many years in the restaurant industry and working at this particular store was by far the.worst experience ive ever had. But i know this isnt all Dennys because there are alot of Dennys in the surrounding area that i heard are amazing to work at. But unless your extremely desperate and willing to give up all your time and energy to work 24/7 and most likely be unappreciated for all the work you do do ...i would suggest literally choosing any and i mean any other job position available then this one.

A typical day at work I would come in a good 10-15 minutes before my shift put my things away whether I was hosting or serving it depended Hosting I would come in and prepare my register made sure i had 100 to begin with I would put on a smile and seat customers offer drinks if the server was running behind and was okay with it bus tables if they needed help and cash people out to here compliments about whether it was their server or the atmosphere as a host I've been offered tips out of the kindness of peoples hearts just for fun whether it was just because they said I was working too hard or prepared a to go order in its boxes. I learned how to manage money and make sure not to come up short I learned to be more patient with people you know some people just have a bad day and if there's attitude you just smile through it and in the end it was clean up my area. serving I would find out which station i'd be working in and i'd make sure my area was cleaned up nice things in it's places and once I got a customer in my area i'd go to work make conversation here and there friendly smiling all around I learned more social skills, eye contact, it was a confident booster having to face people to get the job done I learned to organize to be faster about my orders I got pretty good tips a 20$ 40$ tip here and there, I made sure they got everything needed and ordered. The hardest part of the job was the getting into it no one really trained me trained me you had to just pick it up or drown another part was the waiting on the food the kitchen there not going to lie was pretty slow sometimes so it was just constantly informing the customers on the wait to keep them aware and happy and another issue was i've never heard of a place running out of things as much as they did whether it was straws or something but other than that it was okay pretty simple once you've learned the routine. I learned persuasion.We sold kids hungry coupons to make money for kids lunches and I was pretty great at talking into it and making the sales. Other employers were nice helpful of course there was that feeling that not everybody actually liked everybody but that's life I pretty much got along with everyone time would go by pretty fast then once my shift was over I cleaned my station and call it a night the most enjoyable part was talking to my regulars that would come in and have a story to tell and the collecting the tips at the end of course.

A normal day for me is going in, and washing all the dishes left from the shift before me. I had the shift that came in 2 hours after the last dish washer and during the nights there wouldn't be a dishwasher all night. The cook usually takes all the remade dishes and all ingredient containers to the sink to be washed. I wash them with the hot spray gun and I load it into the washing bin, then slide it into the dishwasher and let it wash for about ten to twenty minutes. While I wait for that to finish, I start on loading the next bin so its ready to wash. When they are done in the dishwasher I check if they're all clean and if not I run them back through the dishwasher. I they are done being cleaned, I take the plates, bowls, forks, knives and syrup cups to the front of house and all the cooking utensils to the shelf where they belong. That will usually be my work for the next 4-5 hours. When the rush cools down after lunch, I start to to clean the front of house by mopping the tile and sweeping all the excess trash. I move from the front of house to the bathroom where I take out the trash, refill the soap, toilet paper, and napkins, then I mop inside there too. I clean the mirrors and. toilets too. I continue take the trash from all the trash cans in the seating area and by the counters and coffee machines. I then see if any of the counters need to be filled with napkins , plastic cups, or took picks and condiments. After Im done with that, I move to the kitchen where I mop the floor and sweep if necessary , then I take the all the collected trash to the dumpster in the back of the restaurant . 

I learned a lot about food handling and keeping the food clean and how to keep a kitchen clean. I also learned how to clean and process dirty dishes and put them into the dishwasher. I learned how to take inventory of food items and and ingredients. 
 
The management at Dennys was the best because they understood  my situation and understood what I was going through but also understood that i was willing to work. I also liked how they were understanding that my last job was way different and I needed a little while to get used to.

I didn't plan to leave this job, but after about a month and a half after me starting they shut down to lack of business.

A typical day at work would begin with walking in through the doors 15mins early, have the manager tell me to hurry and attend to a table of 15 people that they have waiting for me. Due to the previous server being slammed, I have to serve every guest that walks in through the doors so that the other server can catch up. We can only multitask so much until we begin to forget things, especially when the server you came to help, is sent on break and you are left alone to serve a hungry crowd. 
Management is horrible, lack of communication, don't let it be something confidential because that spreads like wildfire, unappreciative of their employees, favoritism, indirectly threatening, intimidating, unfair, inconsiderate, your availability doesn't matter because you should appreciate that you have a job that gives you hours, and if you don't go to school or work elsewhere, you will be called to pick up shifts because "you have no life, why in the world can you not come in,".
Co-workers were the only reason why I was able to stay for so long, they were usually there to help and prevent you from getting in trouble, but then there were those that only fended for themselves and would throw you under the bus in hopes that the GM would favor them. I was usually lucky to work shifts that had workers who cared for one another because we all knew the bad treatment of management.
Hardest part about the job was knowing one manager believed I was a good worker, she would usually look out for me, but she could only do so much for me, unfortunately she was very forgetful, and because of it, I had to go through unfair consequences through no fault of my own. 
The most enjoyable part of the job was getting to know your guests, and being able to see your coworkers day to day considering you had no other life than work. The best feeling was having people recognize you outside the restaurant, and remember you as the best server there. When bar rushes were over, it was nice to look at your coworkers and laugh off the stress and what was a hectic restaurant, because we all knew we made plenty of tips that night with the help of one another.

A typical day at the corporate office became increasingly stressful and disorganized after the leadership changes and new CEO took over. There was a noticeable shift toward aggressive cost-cutting, unrealistic expectations, and constant restructuring that created confusion across departments. Employees were expected to take on heavier workloads with fewer resources, while communication from upper leadership often felt disconnected from the realities of day-to-day operations.

I learned how to adapt in a constantly changing environment, manage high-pressure situations, and remain professional despite declining morale. The experience also taught me the importance of strong leadership, transparency, and employee support in maintaining a healthy and productive workplace culture.

Management steadily became one of the biggest challenges. Decisions from executive leadership often appeared reactive rather than strategic, and many long-term employees felt their experience and feedback were ignored. Since the buyout and transition in leadership, morale seemed to decline significantly, with increased turnover and growing frustration among employees who felt the company was losing direction.

The workplace culture shifted from collaborative and stable to tense and uncertain. Employees often felt overworked, undervalued, and concerned about the company’s future. There was a strong sense that profitability was prioritized over employee well-being, which negatively impacted engagement and retention throughout the organization.

The hardest part of the job was dealing with constant operational changes, lack of clear direction, and the pressure to meet unrealistic expectations while resources and support continued to decrease. It became difficult to stay motivated in an environment where many employees no longer felt heard or appreciated.

The most enjoyable part of the job was working alongside dedicated coworkers who genuinely cared about supporting one another despite the challenges. Many employees worked incredibly hard to keep operations moving smoothly even as conditions became more difficult under the new leadership structure.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Cook 1023 salaries reported	$17.67 per hour
Restaurant manager 783 salaries reported	$57,233 per year
Server 787 salaries reported	$17.21 per hour
Host/hostess 306 salaries reported	$14.47 per hour
General manager 240 salaries reported	$62,547 per year

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