Did Millennials Ruin the Service Industry?

I worked a busy Lunch shift, I printed line up notes, changed out the specials cards on the menu and updated the POS buttons, chatted with the Chef de cuisine about kitchen liquor orders, my Silvert needs and general bitching about the lack of tidiness in the PDR. I stayed for line up to talk about a new Armagnac and to scold the FOH for leaving 3, 1/4 used roles of toilet paper in random corners of the restaurant. Start the shift with a full fuking role in the guest bathrooms please!  I slipped away without any goodbyes or touching any of the 5pm VIP tables, opened the door to busy New York City streets and breathed deeply.  I didn't want to go “out” but I knew I wanted a cheeky drink before boarding the slow as molasses M train to Queens.  

JG Melon was too far of a walk in the wrong direction  ( My favorite somewhat local)  for a cold one, so I opted for PJ Clarkes instead, it was only 3 blocks away and in the correct direction home.  Finance bro’s crowded the front door smoking with their jackets off and the quintessential “cool chick” from the office shot me a dirty look when I not so politely walked through their cloud of E and cigarette smoke, grabbed the door handle and pushed the big wood door open. I threw my tote on the floor and slung my blazer on the back of the only empty bar stool.  “Hey my darlin, what can I getcha?”

A polite older Irish bartender asked me.  Everyone around me was a regular and I wasn't, I was jealous and shouted back “Pilsner on draft and a bowl of clam chowder, extra oyster crackers please.  “ 

I wasn't expecting to order food but quickly realized after I sat down that I hadn't eaten since 3:45 the day before and it was 5:30, and now I’m starving.  

“They're  famous for their chowder ya know, I’ve been coming here since it was the only building on the block, every day for lunch.  My wife and I are celebrating our 60th wedding anniversary, there was no way we weren't making a pit stop here.  We had a huge party with all the kids last night in our apartment, 45 people!”  This stranger spoke so familiarly to me, I looked behind my right shoulder twice to make sure he was actually talking to me (or maybe even just himself) and not someone behind.    

The bar was packed and I was being bumped into every few minutes, but I didn't mind this new friend, even though my smile was a bit rehearsed, it was convincing. I have had years of practice working in the bar and restaurant industry and can easily make strangers feel comfortable, a gift and a curse.

   “ My wife is in the bathroom you will meet her, she's great!”

I could tell this white feathered haired old man in a boring but expensive blue suit was very sweet and a bit buzzed. In front of him were 4 empty Collins glasses with spent lime wedges, melty ice and bent red plastic straws, I assumed he and his wife were drinking gin and tonics, because that's what I like to drink.  This stranger didn't tell me his name or ask mine, but was happy to tell me about his life.   I was content to be sitting next to him, thinking about his children and grandchildren in one room celebrating the matriarchs and patriarchs of the family, forgetting my back ache and financial troubles for a minute to celebrate him and this great life he is living, the Pilsner was really hitting.  I imagined their giant Upper East Side apartment that can easily fit 45 people, the eldest son raising a glass of champagne to toast his very successful and loving parents, I relaxed into my bar stool and took down a big spoonful of warm chowder and sighed a big long after work deep sigh.

“ But what's with all those tattoos, all these beautiful girls and these tattoos?  It's horrible!”  

I immediately soured, I haven't gotten a new tattoo in probably 6 years, if not more and I don't even see them on my arm anymore.  My right arm is basically covered in tattoos from wrist to elbow.  “ I've known some sailors and they had tattoos, that's ok, but on a woman, this really isn't ok.”  All the wrinkles on his brow and chin met at his nose as he scolded me, a 37 year old woman, restaurant and bar manager, with a mid price jcrew blazer on her chair.

The thing is, the older I get the more I really don't like my tattoos and realized, yes at one point I loved them, but maybe I should have listened to my Mother.   But this boomer, even though I kind of agreed, I wanted to throw my hot bowl of clam chowder in his fucking face for telling me my tattoos were ugly.  I chose them, whether they mean the world to me or not, this was my counter culture. I got them when I first moved to New York and started getting serious about my career in bars and restaurants and at one point, I wanted them for forever.

When I started to understand food, restaurants, service, bartending and cocktails, Brooklyn was really coming into its own, especially Williamsburg and Greenpoint, The” New New York.”  I would always get mad at the junkies drinking in dives in the East Village complaining how “clean the City was now”, I mean how clean could it be if they were still shooting up in Thompson Square Park? They were talking about the fancy cocktail bars and specialty restaurants us 25 year olds were working in, the attention to detail, the farms, purveyors and understanding the seasons. And yes all the tatted bartenders and cooks that worked in them.  The white table cloth fine dining restaurants were only teaching us we would never be good enough to learn about wine and we shouldn't try.  But we all lived in Brooklyn, Williamsburg, Bushwick, I lived in Crown heights which wasn't off the L, so it confused people.  A  group of ragtag 20 somethings that were drinking Sangre y Trabajo, shots of Chi Chi, chased by pet nat rose were about to change the restaurant industry and no one saw it coming.  

Robertas had opened with their tiki bar in the back, Diner was the hottest restaurant where servers scribbled the menu on paper, Torst was the brand new beer bar and we all waited in line to spend our hard earned money at St Anselm, (they famously did not take reservations.) I’ll never forget riding my bike to Brouwerij Lane for their interesting rotating beers on tap, Sitting in candle lit Achilles Heel on first and second dates and drinking deep into the night because I had no clue what time it was. We ate ramen at Chuko and then walked over to Weather Up or Tooker Alley for a really great cocktail.  Everywhere felt like a secret hidden gem, it was spread out and special. I worked in a dark wood bar in Long Island city that was surrounded by absolutely nothing, a few years later UBER would open their first offices across the street, a few years after that Girls would come out on HBO and we would scoff at how embarrassing it was, when really it was hitting too close to home. Now a new generation is discovering the show and it still fuking hits, maybe even harder now than before.

This was the anti establishment, anti floral arrangement, kitchen towel blue and white rags as restaurant napkins, cool ass playlist restaurant ( Beach House, LCD, Grizzly Bear,) microbrewery, a lot of clogs tidal wave, and maybe a few dirty looks from your severs. The Fancy Kale salad, that is all I have to say about that subject.  10 bells opened in 2008, I discovered it a few years later, the anti Somm wine bar didn't have any rules, She Wolf Bakery was born, “barn yardy” basque cider was cool, the Meat Hook opened and we got really into funky cheese.   The collective “We” didn’t  want your fine dining bullshit, we can't afford it and we don't need to be nice to you.  We actually won't be nice to you.  We were not Danny Meyer, you cannot get the sauce on the side, no substitutions, no vegetarian option.  I worked at a restaurant that would only serve you a steak MR, a true MR that was bloody and that's it.  We had an “ add Foie” button on our Aloha screen … you could add a side of seared Foie Gras to any dish on the menu! Ask Karin Stanley about a real Snaquerie, its not a tiny shot, I know this because there have been moments when I coudnt’t close my bar bank at the end of the night.

We had to say no, to reset the minds of our diners, but did we go too far?  

I am not the first person to complain about the generation that precedes it, I find it really hard to express myself, especially when this younger generation has so many outlets to do so. I am so bored, reading how the pandemic took away all the best bar and restaurant workers, and how hard it is to find good help.  But I’m still here, I still work hard, I still have these tattoos and dirty clogs and carhartt pants, but maybe I’m just tired.   But there are so many “WE’s” or “ We-es” that are working hard and aiming for only excellence and tired as well.

The younger generation has their pronouns and their morals and their high ground,  they ask for what they want even though they haven’t put the work in. They aren’t scared of sex work, gender, fashion, armpit and leg hair, men in tiny ass skirts. Do you think they will go through a “ hipster, fedora phase like we did ?” But the internet is making it, so that they don’t have to work the grueling hours we did, by exposure to the world, for knowledge and to get themselves out there and to ask for more.

I ask myself, is this what we did? In 2012 we took what we wanted and didn’t wait for anyone to notice or tell us no, also most of my friends who worked in the restaurant industry were broke and hustling.  I think that is a big difference, working hard and being physically hungry can make anyone mean to a bar guest and want more from their employer, but we still worked,

The one thing about boomers is that they always worked hard,  were diligent and never asked for a hand out or help from their parents.  They probably wouldn’t have gotten said help even if they asked.  Of course it wasn’t that hard to land a good job, a decent salary could buy a house and a car. “Times were different then," but they still act like it’s the same “ times” and we all need to get our millennial act together.  They judge us for taking advantage of the internet, trying to be our own bosses and for drinking nice coffee. But they passed emotional and generational trauma, being 30 in the 80’s kept the “ pushing things under the rug” culture alive. Therapy means, there is something wrong with you, rub dirt in it, work harder but also listen to Earth Wind and Fire and the Kinks, understand Woodstock but don’t actually acknowledge problems or work to make them better.

As I am getting older, I expected things to get easier, maybe the younger restaurant generation would come in, work 13 hour shifts, be humble, remember what grapes are on the BTG menu? We want the older established diners to order $300 bottles of wine on a Tuesday and not be too high maintenance or ask for their chilled corn soup in August to be heated up as a chowder. Things aren’t getting easier, they are actually getting harder. Us silly Millennials are the “Stuck Generation,” It’s actually exhausting.

I ate my soup pretty quickly, I wanted to get home, my exhaustion was setting in.  Finally this man’s wife shakily came out of the bathroom, holding on to the back of my bar stool,

“This is my beautiful wife, meet my new friend!” ( he never asked me my name)  She waved politely at me and he threw a wad of cash on the bar, “Thanks Jimmy, see ya next week!” And he exited out door left without more than a quick nod.

A group of early 20 something’s busted into the back dining room to my right without taking their sunglasses off, laughing, screeching and wearing Jnco style jeans and belly shirts with naval piercings.

Maybe I was always trying to prove something, that I was someone. But that’s what makes New York so fucking great, it can bring the best and the worst out in people. The bar and restaurant rats I will always love the most. You know who you are.

I finished my beer and clam chowder, took my last oyster cracker in my mouth and cracked it in a perfect half with my two front teeth. Success.

I love New York watering holes like this.

“How about another Pilsner sweetheart ?” 

“Yeah Jimmy I’ll take another Pilsner.”