State College, Pa. - There are
waiters who are really actors, just biding their time until they get
their big break. There are waiters who are really aspiring writers
or models or musicians.
And then, there are actually waiters
who are really, truly waiters. All are welcome at The Waiters Association.
"It's OK to be a waiter and want to
remain a waiter, and it's also OK to be a waiter while you're looking for
something else." association co-founder Vivienne Wildes said.
The association was founded last
year to "upgrade the status of waiters in America to a career level."
That involves pro,oting morale, improving service and - on the practical side -
providing information about group health insurance policies.
"The time is ripe to dispel the myth
that waiters are wannabes seeking other employment," Wildes wrote in the
group's first newsletter.
SO FAR, ABOUT 1,000 waiters
and waitresses who work everywhere from truck stops to fine restaurants have
joined the association. And they seem grateful for any recognition that it
may bring to their unhonored profession.
"Self-respect really struck me as an
important issue," said Jim Miller, a 42-year-old waiter at Philadelphia's
Four Seasons Hotel and a 21-year industry veteran. "One guy at work says
he's doing this temporarily, but after eight to 10 years, I question it."
"Another friend told me 10 years ago,
'I'm not a professional. I'm not a waiter.' He's been doing this now for 20
years," said Miller.
"Everybody talks about getting out of
it but nobody does," said Linda Ackerman, who trains banquet waiters for
Serve Tech Food and Beverage Inc. of Santa Monica, Calif. "I think that
secretly you love it."
Wildes and Gerard Foley, who worked together
as teen-agers at The Triangle restaurant in Mountaintop, established the
association in 1992, 10 years after the idea hit Wildes during a chef's meeting
in Washington, D.C.
"At that time, everybody said, 'Waiters?
Who?'" Wildes said. "In many circles, they still say that."
Now Wildes, a 36-year-old graduate student in
hotel, restaurant and institutional management at Penn State, works from a
2½-story house in State College to promote waiters as salespeople,
not just order takers.
"Chefs have a reputation, but waiters
are your first contact with the guest and the last contact with you guest,"
she said. "This is true with one-star service and five-star service."
A LOOK AT Saturday public television
programs and bookstore shelves illustrates cooks' increasing prestige. But
waiters have few such role models, and they are often treated poorly.
Miller says co-workers have been denied
apartments because landlords didn't like their hours or feared they couldn't
pay. Wildes said she and her husband, also a waiter, needed a congressman's
intervention when a home-loan application got stuck because the bank didn't
consider tips reliable income.
"I would love to talk to Vivienne and
start a national media campaign for waiters. People don't see this as a real
job," said Jim Naftulin, 48, a waiter for 15 years at Fior d'Italia in San
Francisco. "Chefs are now celebrities, and all they are glorified cooks."
To help upgrade the profession, The Waiters
Association offers job networking, uniform discounts and instruction on the
latest wines. The few union shops available provide mostly bargaining power for
wages and working conditions, Ackerman said.
"There's no formal training or education
for waiters. There's been no networking," Ackerman said. "What other
way is there for waiters to come together to get insurance and gain additional
knowledge?"
The association publishes the newsletter
"Hospitality" every other month or so. A "Tips" column
offers ideas on improving service and the advice column "Ask Vi"
answers tough questions:
I know the customer is king, but is the customer always right?
Where do I look a person in the eye if they have a glass eye or walleye?
(Answers: No. 1 - No, but a good waiter
makes the customer feel right. Question No. 2's answer will be published
in a future issue with help from an ophthalmologist Wildes plans to contact.)
WILDES, THE daughter of a waitress,
no longer waits tables. But her skills haven't declined. Within 90 seconds of
seating someone at her dining room table, she offers water and beverages.
Her husband, Joe Beddall, won't let a guest
leave without lunch - but it's served from the right instead of the customary left.
"You have to take a day off,"
Beddall said.
"We have friends who come over and are
relieved that everything on the table doesn't match," Wildes said. "We
don't take our careers home with us."
That's one reason Naftulin still enjoys his job.
"It gives me short hours, cash money and
the ability to come in and do my job and not carry it home with me," Naftulin
said. "It's like having a party at your house every night, except you don't
have to do the dishes."
(EDITOR'S NOTE - The Waiters
Association can be reached at 1100 W. Beaver Ave., State College, Pa., 16801.)
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