Team WaiterBell: Advice, Ideas, and Resources for Restaurant-Goers

The perspective of the restaurant worker, which is often ignored, has recently become more accessible through print ("My Week as a Waiter"), media (i.e. the movie "Waiting…"), and the internet (Waiterrant.net). 

This may be due to more people working in restaurants (nearly 50% of adults have worked in the restaurant industry, source: NRA), and more people going to restaurants (no other country eats out as frequently as those in the United States, source: AOL).  

Many times, servers are debating with customers in message boards or forums about the nature of the profession. Servers will talk about customers who lack patience, respect, and consideration for servers. Customers who have experienced bad service will remark on servers who are uncaring, unprofessional, and inconsiderate of customers. The relationship between customer and server is put on eggshells when there isn't consideration and mutual respect. 

To balance out the numerous consumer sites where diners post their experiences, the following are links to sites where content is written by restaurant workers:

WaiterRant
BitterWaitress
The Stained Apron
Server Stories
The Insane Waiter
Waitress On the Sea
Restaurant Gal
Restaurant Girl Speaks
Manhattan Waitress
Shameless Restaurant
Waiting Tables
The Angry Waiter
The Food Liberation Front
Red Lobster Hates Its Employees

also, here is a recent article about restaurant workers on the internet: 

excerpt:
"Sites like BitterWaitress have been on the Internet since the beginning, but now they reach more people than ever. That's partly because the Web is becoming such a staple in people's lives: 72 percent of all U.S. adults use it, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

"Before blogs, very few people had means to express their ideas," he said. "Now, people have a distribution method."

Fehlinger, a veteran New York City waiter, started the site as a newsletter. He added celebrity gossip, tidbits from servers about stars' tipping habits, and a section where waiters and waitresses could post their own "war stories" about managers and customers.

Those war stories, which are anonymous, range from reasoned complaints to wild rants. Individual restaurants aren't frequently named, although some could be identified by details given."

source: "Gripers throng the Internet" by Mike Hughlett and Eric Benderoff (Chicago Tribune, Mar. 26, 2006)

Happy Eating.