To the Man Who Told Me "Fuck You" Last Night

I'm going to have to ask cedichou and Meathenge to weigh in here.

Sir:

When I saw you coming up the stairs with your friend, both of you helping your young children, I smiled. I spoke with your friend, shook his hand, he told me about the beach and the sunset and I told him about the sunset from the ridge top yesterday. I introduced myself to his son, you and yours were already heading towards your table. I saw there were 4 of you big people and 2 children and I recognized at least one of the women as local, though not a customer. You all looked nice, I was happy.

When the GM told me you had been negotiating for a larger table, one for 8 people and one "farther away from other people", I smiled again. As I've mentioned before in this blog, we seat people in particular places for a reason and the GM is very good at knowing where people should go. I knew she gave you her response to this request, "The table for 8 is actually too large for 4 adults and 2 children. You'll be very comfortable here. And all our tables are next to another."

When your waiter came over to tell us you had requested to go across the street to get a pizza for the children I was smiling, although out of amusement now rather than a warm, fuzzy feeling. When we sent her back with our polite but firm, "no, I'm sorry response", I didn't expect to see you get out of your seat and come to the front.

When you said "I'll make you a deal. How about we stay right up front here away from the table with the pizza" my amusement changed to disbelief. When the GM and I told you "I'm sorry sir, we just can't do that", the GM adding "it costs me money for your children to occupy a seat here. You could order your food to go and take it across the street to the pizza place and see how they handle it" I could see you didn't believe we were actually saying no. I could also see you knew exactly what the pizza place would have said. You and I know they bill themselves "the home of the adult pizza", that they have about 20 seats max and though we are friends with them and eat in each other's places all the time, we both know they would have given you exactly the same response we did.

When you said "my son has a very limited diet" I should have offered solutions. I should have assured you that we'd be able to make something that the little person would have enjoyed. Instead, I again repeated, "I'm sorry". When you said, "And you call yourselves a family restaurant" instead of saying, "We never called ourselves family restaurant" though that is true, we haven't, I should have said as the GM suggested, "Sir, we are a restaurant, period. We sell food." People have gotten engaged at our place but that doesn't make it a romantic spot, people have broken up at our tables, but we don't bill ourselves as the best place to leave your lover. We serve families, solo diners, happy and unhappy couples, motorcycle groups, wedding parties, speed freaks, people celebrating their 60th anniversaries and other chefs from the area. I wouldn't say that we cater to any of those groups.

When you said "Fuck you." I did exactly what I should do. I stood there and did nothing. I'm quite proud I didn't turn into Travis Bickle, saying, "Fuck me? Fuck me? FUCK ME?! FUCK YOU!!!!" And then spitting out a frothing mass of invective that would have made you wish you were never born.

When you apologized on your way out, did you realize you said, "I'm sorry I lost that", rather than I'm sorry I lost it? Minor point perhaps, but I think it gives me a clue that you saw this as a battle, that you had entrenched yourself and the only thing you could possibly do was to leave, and in so doing, making your friends leave with you. When I assured you, "That's fine" I was commiserating. I've been there, and boy did I feel stupid after losing my temper.

To the friend who told me he had been really looking forward to the meal: I told you then you could still enjoy yourself. Leaving was your choice.

Back to Mr Fuck You: Beyond the simple economics. A restaurant seat does indeed generate revenue, well, the seat doesn't, the person in the seat does. Some restaurants know by meal period, by hour, by any way you want to know, how much revenue they expect that seat to produce. We don't process that sort of information but we do know our per person average, and we do know that children won't come close to consuming anywhere near that average. So, in a certain sense we are losing money every time a child dines with us. Certainly in another sense we are making money because the parents are spending money and seats with someone in them are generating more revenue than seats with no one in them. We also know, sweeping generalization here, that responsible parents when dining with their children spend a bit less than when they come in on their own. Note I say responsible. There are some folks out there who might think nothing of downing a 5th glass of wine with their three year old at the table but fortunately we don't see too many of them. Or even being by themselves they might be more inclined to have an appetizer, entree, dessert, coffee, etc, than when they are concerned with a shorter attention span.

Where you got the idea we are a family restaurant I don't know. Perhaps because we have crayons on the tables. Perhaps you have friends who have told you how gracious and welcoming we are to them and their children. One such family dined with us the night before and was in two nights before that. Don't let these people fool you. You can talk with others in town who will tell you what horrible, vicious people we are because we spoke directly to their children and told them that their behavior was disturbing other people and that they would need to take their seats and draw or play quietly at their table.

Where you got the idea it's ok to order a pizza to bring into another restaurant I'll never know. Granted, I have read about some restaurants, who eager for "family" business will make arrangements to do something like what you were proposing. I doubt you have read about them, since I see this in trade papers and it is clear we are not in the same business. Even if this were business I were pursuing, I certainly wouldn't be looking to outside sources for the food. I'd make it. That's how I make my living. Now mind, I am not saying to the parents of a toddler who bring a banana to mash up at the table to let me sell you the banana, nor do I mind unduly the occasional request to warm up some baby food for a young toothless person. Saying that, I do realize I'm on a slippery slope here. Is there a cut-off age, particular type of food? I'm drawing the line at sitting erect, wielding a utensil and having even limited conversation.

But sir, beyond the sheer economics, I spend an average of 11 hours per day working. Making food. Worrying about food. Worrying about my customers comfort. Worrying about whether they will like the food. By telling me there's nothing I can cook your son that he will eat you are slapping me in the face. And few people like being insulted.

After you left, the waiter told me that others at your table were saying "No, don't ask, don't ask." This tells me either you knew your request was out of line, or they were advising you to just do it and not ask. I'll go with the former. And this sir, is what infuriates me more than anything else. I hate when people try to justify what they know to be untrue, whether it's our administration doing it, you doing it or when the GM and I disagree over something we actually agree on. When you know your argument is invalid why the hell do you try to make it? You didn't take your food to go and try to eat at the pizza place because you knew they wouldn't accept that. If your kid doesn't eat anything but pizza why didn't you take care of that before dining with your friends?

Which brings me to another point. Some kids will eat readily and some won't. I get this. I also get coming from a background where at times what we had for dinner might have been all that was in the house, I get picking up out of date items from a supermarket dumpster as a kid because I did it. I get hunger. Not as acutely as some. But I get it. By letting your son decide where you and your friends will eat, you are producing another person like yourself. Entitled, rude and abusive when things don't go his way. Your job is to prepare this young soul for life among his fellows. Part of that job is teaching him how to deal with situations where he's not getting what he wants. Your behavior last night taught him a pretty poor lesson. And deprived you and your friends of a great meal, in an inviting atmosphere. The place across the street makes good pizza, I eat it frequently, but it's not where you set out to go.

You should also know that minutes after you left a party of 5 came in. A man about your age, who has a son the same age as our restaurant. The son was not with the party last night it's true. But in contrast, the family is a favorite of ours. Their son is a dwarf, and while that has at times put a strain on their relationship, and I'm sure has produced some heartbreaking moments, they are positive, upbeat people, who have not let their son's condition turn them into bitter, entitled people. They have brought their son to dine with us since he was an infant and we had just opened. One of our waiters knitted him a hat when he was two and we always loved to see him in the high chair at the beginning of the meal and then zonked out by the end. Dad and his friends took a table, had another great evening and left happy. If that's being a family restaurant, I suppose we are.

Now ced and Biggles, give me the dad's perspective. You're about the same age and both as far as I can tell trying to do a good job being dad. I know there was another resolution, but I didn't feel like one was available in the moment. To be fair to the dad I also was so stunned that I probably was less willing to entertain other solutions, feeling that if he didn't get why it wasn't ok to bring food from another restaurant into ours that I was less willing to to try to solve his problem.

Comments

[haddock]

Just after I posted this I got the following email:

"Dear Chef,
The dinner we had at XXXX on Thursday evening was superb. We chose to have your special for mushroom lovers. That simple salad of arugula and trumpet mushrooms with truffle dressing was exceptional in its simplicity holding complex flavors in a great marriage. The rest of the meal was delicious as well. Thanks for the ONLY food experience in XXXXX during the Mushroom Festival 2005 that was worthy of favorable mention. Thank you too for the modest price. The meal was something we could afford that still made us feel that we were having a special outing. We also had our granddaughter with us (age 10). She is not exactly a 'shroom aficionado. The waiter chose bocatinni for her as something she could enjoy. She did. We appreciated his efforts. That hand-made pasta is great! We'll be back!"

Hmmmmm.....

[jsp]

Okay more to the story...

While Mr. F You was throwing his finger flipping tantrum two diners watched. After the family left the two diners, who are owners of another local restaurant, asked what happened. Their response was "No!". Yes it really did happen. The other restaurant owners put Mr. F You's face to memory in case he tries it at their restaurant.

Also, the health inspector and her assistant were in for dinner, I told the assistant about the incident after she started talking about a trend she has been seeing. She said she's noticed a trend of people feeling a sense of entitlement. So I gave her a fresh example. Her response was "get out!" She said being a customer is a cooperative experience.

One possible solution that I thought of after the initial shock and disbelief passed is: we charge corkage. We could have charged him the corkage fee for bringing in his own FOOD. Would he have agreed to paying for that? Most likely not. But it could have been another solution.

So when the daddy didn't get his way he threw a tantrum. Just like junior not getting his way and throwing a tantrum. The only thing anybody learned last night was the waitor. She was upset because she had brought them water, taken their order and lost a table. Then she had to clean up their mess and reset the table. All for no money. Do you think they left a tip on the table for her? NO. They are entitled and the world owes THEM. I talked the waitor through the moment, told her now her table was open for good customers who would be nice, order lots and tip well. Which is exactly what happened. The very next table was hers. They were awesome, regular customers who had a great time, tipped well and were full of compliments.

[johng]

This resonates with me on several levels:

1 - Boy am I glad I don't deal with customers anymore.

2- No restaurant customer behavior, no matter how aberrant is capable of surprising me. The closest thing I have heard to this is what happened to a friend at a top Napa Valley bistro during lunch one day, when a group of four were seated at table, ordered some sodas and asked for bread, then busted open a picnic basket and started eating pate and cheese

3- Boy am I glad I don't deal with customers anymore.

4 - I don't want to get too far into the old "you don't know what it's like unless you have kids" thing, but I will say that feeding the little suckers can make you a little crazy, like when you're in the only restaurant in a village thousands of miles from home, and your kid decides that the only "American" thing on the menu is not to his liking.

5- You did the right thing in not attempting to persuade the guy that you could do something for the kids. Your instinct guided you. I used to work in a place where there was no chicken on the menu and the only pasta came with tripe. When people freaked about, you developed a sense of who to talk into staying, and who to let go.

6 - If that's how he treats you imagine how he treats the kid.

7- You're lucky you met him there, rather than on the road. Sounds like the kind of dude who pulls out his handgun when somebody cuts him off.

8 - Boy am I glad I don't deal with customers anymore.

[cedichou]

I would not know how to handle the situation any better than you did. What age was the kid?

I don't see anything wrong in your handling the situation. They asked something that is unacceptable, and you stood your ground. That the guy did not shut up at this point, but proceeded to insult you is absolutely unbelievable.

You ask about our own experience:
I would sometime request to be at an isolated table, because our kid might get noisy, and disturb the other diners. Also, I would understand the request for a larger table, as sometimes a kid could grab stuff and break stuff, or whatnot, so it is better to have some real estate separating the parents' utensiles from the kid. I would only make such a request if obviously there was no crunch of space or large tables, but I could see myself making those.

We usually try to order food for us that we can share with our kid. We tend to over-order, but I can handle it. We often bring home-made food for him though. Less now that he eats pretty much everything, but we still do now and then.

I don't really understand the economics of it that you mention. We're typically a couple and a baby, so we occupy a four-top for two consuming people. So the restaurant would make more money serving 4 adults instead of us. But there's never a party of 4 adults being actually turned away because of us. If that hypothetical party does show up, it just waits. We have been in packed places lately (little star pizza, or bar tartine for instance) and they are always happy so see our business.

I don't think you should feel slapped in the face as a cook because one does not want you to cook pizza. They might think it's below you, or that you don't have the ingredients handy.

[nathan]

I know this will sound like the unpopular opinion in the group, and I'm sure this guy wasn't worth your time or business, but it's too bad that an opportunity was missed to make an outstanding impression. If I try to take a look at it from the jerk's point of view, maybe in his twisted logic he was trying to suggest something that would work for both of you. He might have initially thought that you wouldn't want to accomodate his son's dietary needs by cooking something special. He should have just said what they were and let you see what you could do. It just seems like instead of that initial 'no', there could have been an attempt to see what the issue was, maybe anticipating a dietary need. You could have offered to make a pita pizza perhaps or simply pointed out any 'kid-friendly' items you could combine. You could have been sharing with those other diners how you cooled the situation down and he ended up being really happy and then they could have said 'you shouldn't have done that, you're amazing!' rather than simply commiserating.

Obviously with the 'we sell food' and 'it costs money for your child to sit here' responses, there wasn't going to be a positive resolution. I think those responses were entirely out of line, by the way. Your economics shouldn't be of concern to the customer. It should have been enough to say that you were sorry and offer an alternative. The rest was inappropriate on your part.

As you alluded to, it's not just a matter of economics that people shouldn't bring food in from elsewhere; it's a matter of respect. In a way, people sit down at your restaurant to give you the opportunity to make their meal special. The jerk was intending to rob you of this opportunity. A possible justification for why he can't bring food in is that it would be disrespectful to your servers, bussers, cooks, dishwashers, and everyone else who puts in hard work to making his experience a pleasurable one. Would he take a mini TV into a movie, concert, etc.?

Anyway, sorry this jerk took your time with this silliness. In case it makes a difference, I'm not a parent and generally think kids are annoying little buggers.

[haddock]

Nathan:

Just for the record, I didn't tell the guy, "we sell food". I DID write it in my "open letter" to him. I disagree that comments about the economics are out of line. Customers make comments about prices, both that things are cheap or that things are expensive. Knowing the economics of a situation sometimes sheds light on it.

Believe me, we typically waste no opportunities to turn situations around and make outstanding impressions. And when we DID say I'm sorry and DID try to offer alternatives, and he pressed on, only THEN did we let him know our economic reasoning.

ced: I can see you making that request, and I can also see you being aware of how your and your child's behavior is affecting those around you. Unfortunately in our experience a party with children asking for a large, isolated table typically equals parents who have little interest in monitoring their children and they end up being more disruptive than if we sat them next to a couple. Sound does carry.

As to the food, believe me it wasn't out of kindness to me that the guy was asking to buy the pizza. He wasn't giving us the opportunity to do anything other than what he thought should happen.

Also ced, in SF a four top will wait. We're spoiled up here and a lot of times, people won't. Three people in line at the DMV produces a frustrated, "Oh forget it" response from a person coming in the door. Also, in this particular scenario they were proposing taking up one of our two tables which can handle larger parties and we already had one of them booked.

johng: You still do deal with customers, just not retail. Thanks for the advice and it's true, you don't know what it's like until you have kids. It's sure a lot easier to tell someone what to do than do it yourself.

I don't expect parents to "control" their children. People can't control each other, though some try. I do expect people will make an effort to teach their children manners, how to behave in public and how to conduct them selves in situations where things aren't going their way.

[Dr. Biggles]

Holy fnorking schniz batman.

That was one heck of long post and one hell of a confrontation.

As far as handling customers (I do glue phone support all day long and more), those types of people will cause you grief, der. The pizza wasn't the center point, it was only the beginning. If you'd served them that pizza, there would have been something else that customer would have blown up about. He wanted a fight and got it. I'm suprised you didn't say more, I would have and I do.
As far as being a parent of two smallish boys that began life even smaller. My wife and I make a point of not dining in decent places with them. It isn't personal, but they don't appreciate the food yet (they get great stuff at home, eh) and my wife and I need time together. I would never and have never asked outside food be served to me. Sure I've brought crackers or a cookie to keep them quiet, you bet. The few times we have gone out with them I require that they behave and if not, we go out and walk the neighborhood until my wife finishes, or vice versa. Then we leave quietly with the leftovers in tow. I love leaving tips cause at the end of the day, it's all about the money and not causing others grief.
I would have pointed to the door and said, "There's the door, use it."

Biggles

[jsp]

The basic part of this story is the child, about 2-years-old, would ONLY eat pizza. Otherwise he was going to throw a fit. The dad would ONLY feed him pizza. When he couldn't HE threw a fit.

Had we been given the opportunity we would have been completely happy to make "pizza". We could have put marinara and mozzarella on a slice of bread. We could have served an unlimited amount of requests. We were not given the option. They had already ordered the pizza. He wanted to bring it in with the box. His only suggestions was we leave the box up front and serve him his pizza on a plate. Had they descretly brought in a piece wrapped in foil or something that would have been different. But how would it look to the rest of my customers and staff if they strolled in with a pizza box? How about a McDonalds bag? If the child could only eat pizza feed him before coming in. The sad part is a 2-year-old was controlling four adults. Maybe our economics are not his problem. But then his lack of parenting skills and inability to feed his child is not ours. But see that is a bad way at looking at things. We are all in this little dance together. My role is to feed him. His role is to buy the food we make. My role is not providing a comfy place for him to sit for free.

When people request a table "far away" they are, usually, not considering that the host or hostess is considering the best spot for them, in many respects.

MOST parents who want a table "far away" have little intention of trying to keep their children under cotrol. They usually sit a the table and forget they have kids for an hour. They let them leave the table, wander around the restaurant and say "how cute" when the little one plays by other diners. Some other diners don't find it cute. Some other diners got a babysitter so they didn't have to deal with children for a while and resent "cute" junior disturbing them.

My responses to this topic have been long. I appologize. But it is an important subject. Ignorant, lazy parenting is a big problem in our society. Daily I see caring, observant parenting or selfish, inconsiderant parenting. And the results in the children's behavior is predictable in both circumstances.

[cedichou]

I don't want to take the defense of your awful customer, whose behavior is just plain wrong.

But I need to point that, if the kid is 2yo, there is little you can do to negotiate with the kid. The age between 2 and 3 is called the 'terrible twos' because the kid just learns to say NO, and no really means no. Kids are not half-hearted, they mean no very very passionately. It means that the diet of the kid at age 2 is all out of whack, as they say NO to food a lot. We cannot show bread around dinner time, as if our kid sees it, then that's what he wants, not the meat and veggies we prepared. And when a 2yo makes a scene, it is quite a scene too. You just cannot control a 2yo, they just haven't learned yet how to control themselves. There is no bad or good parenting in handling a 2yo, you just cross your fingers and hope everything will be alright.

Biggles suggestion to leave the kid at home is best in this case; we don't like planning when we go out, so we go with the kid, but we go: early, when restaurants are not too crowded and the kid is not too hungry and fussy; we are ready to live with take-out and a large tip behind if it gets out of hands; we usually have some back-up food (cereal, fruit juice) that we know will keep him happy and some crayons and paper;

I just discovered that a 2yo just loves pizza, btw, especially little star.

[haddock]

I hear you ced. As I hope I made clear, what upset me was the dad not seeing that we had valid reasons for not wanting a pizza delivery in our dining room.

Believe me, I realize no one wins a negotiation with a 2 yo.

[haddock]

Plus I think the kid was older than that anyway.

[Kudzu]

Wow. This seems to be a dramatic test for chefs, restarauteurs and diners.

I have dined out with children and grands, taking my son to lunch after his six-week well baby check-up to Pete's Tavern in Manhattan. He also went with us in his stroller to outdoor cafes in the Village. But when we wanted to have a grown-up meal we left him with a nice lady babysitter.

There is no excuse for your having to provide dinner for a little person who will eat nothing but pizza. I have dealt with kids whose food has to be all white, or who exist on Cheerios. This is the parents' problem and should not be an accepted expectation at a restaurant.

None of this has anything to do with the attitude of the Big Daddy whose behavior was out of bounds.
It was his performance that was the tossed grenade.

One more example of entitlement, and I am getting ever more weary of observing, dealing with and trying to write off that element of behavior in all aspects of consumerism, not just the restaurant business.

Corragio!

[Patrick]

Wow what an interesting post and I think you deserve some kudos for putting up a well written and reflective (albeit long) post. Personally I think you handled it fairly well given the circumstances.