By David Hopkins The restaurant industry is facing a significant crisis: staffing. It’s a trend that has been particularly exacerbated over the last several months and, unfortunately, shows little sign of vanishing soon – foodservice operations across the country are struggling to find, hire, and retain staff. So, why is this happening, and what can […]
By Matt Parkin Restaurant staffing can be a challenge at this time of year. With the supply chain slowdowns, rising menu prices, and the holidays fast approaching, you can’t afford to have your restaurant understaffed. The problem is that the labour market is tight and unemployment is low so there isn’t a huge pool of […]
Are you scanning resumes, making calls, and scheduling interviews, but dealing with daily no-shows? Being ghosted by prospective employees is a common challenge for restaurateurs. Recent studies indicate that restaurants and bars are about 600,000 jobs short of pre-pandemic levels, so getting past the interview stage is crucial to hiring – and keeping – a […]
New statistics from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics suggest that amid the ongoing economic turmoil, the landscape is changing. Restaurants are finding room to hire more workers while wages are levelling out. The new data showed that restaurants and bars increased their pace of hiring in July, adding more staff than they did in […]
As the labour crisis continues to plague restaurants, we are reminded yet again that there is no simple solution. Many restaurants are still struggling desperately to maintain a viable level of staffing, and there is no easy answer. The labour pool has shrunk dramatically with many former gig workers leaving the industry, leaving operators to […]
Foodservice operators have been doing all they can to attract more restaurant workers but, amid soaring inflation and food costs, measures like hiking wages, introducing benefits, increasing flexibility, and trimming menus just aren’t getting the job done. Canada’s restaurant industry was devastated by two years of shutdowns, repeated layoffs, and strict capacity limits, and about […]
Quebec’s restaurant and hospitality industry is asking the federal government for help in easing its labour shortage, calling for the loosening of foreign worker rules in time for the summer season. This summer, with open restaurants and COVID-19-related restrictions at their lightest since the pandemic began, is expected to be the busiest season for foodservice […]
As the hiring struggles continue in foodservice, operators are increasingly relying on teenagers to make up a significant proportion of their restaurant workforce. New data from Black Box Intelligence shows that teenagers aged 18 years or younger comprise a significantly larger section of the restaurant workforce than they did in 2019. In limited-service restaurants, teenagers made up […]
Ontario’s restaurants and other foodservice, hospitality, and tourism businesses have been dealing with something of a labour crisis in recent months. That has been attributed to a variety of factors, including staff leaving the workforce for good due to the effects of COVID-19, a perceived lack of job security, government benefits offsetting the financial costs […]
By Bruce McAdams and Rebecca Gordon Restaurant operators across Canada are struggling to find enough staff to run their operations. This labour crisis has been highly publicized by Canadian media as a “labour shortage.” A recent survey by Restaurants Canada found that 80 per cent of foodservice operators were finding it difficult to hire kitchen […]
