Valerie Gets Canned- Part II

-Preface-

When we left off, Valerie was scrubbing floors. The corporate office sacked the regional manager. I am at school in Jersey while my girlfriend is working at The Restaurant. She calls me with regular updates. I'm nervous, as I wrote an email that laid out all the problems that Valerie is causing. She hasn't been fired, and I'm wondering if I've been laid out to dry.

-Valerie Gets Canned, Part II-

I'm in my dorm writing a paper for one of my Anthropology classes. It's a five-pager. In high school, a five-page paper is intimidating. Now it's a breeze. I've been writing for an hour and I already have seven pages. I just have to pare down the flowery language and I'm good to go. There's a party tonight that I don't want to miss.

The phone rings. It's my girl. She's calling from The Restaurant.

"She's still here." She's whispering. She must be on her cell phone in the back.

"Is she still washing the walls?" I love the mental picture of Valerie on her knees with a bucket of soap and a sponge, Cinderella-style.

"No... the new regional made her clean out the entire dry storage. She's still in there. This place reeks like bleach!"

"How's the new regional treating everyone?"

"She's strict, but she loves me... I think she might be a lesbo. She made me unbutton a few buttons on my shirt. My boobs are almost hanging out." I like this new regional manager already.

"Oh, yeah? How are the tips today?"

"Actually, really good." No surprise there. How you look can effect your tip, regardless of your skills as a server. (More on this in another post)

"Nice. People are pigs. Hey, I have to finish this paper, then I'm going to go out. Ice block party tonight. You working tomorrow?"

"Yeah."

"OK. Can you call me if anything else happens?"

"Sure... by the way, what's an ice block party?"

"We got a 300 lb. block of ice. We set it up on a stand and use an iron to melt grooves in it. Whoever wants a shot stands at the bottom with their mouth on the end of the groove. We pour in the booze from the top, and by the time it gets to the bottom, it's ice cold."

"Sounds like fun! Wish I could be there..." I can hear her pouting. Truth of the matter is, I wish she could be here too. When you're at school, you forget what it feels like to get a hug from a loved one.

"I know, baby. I wish you could be here, too. Give me a call tomorrow, ok?"

"Will do. I better get back..." Click.

OK, back to the paper. I hate Foucalt....

---

The phone is ringing. So is my head. Jaeger is the devil, especially when it's being poured down an icy chute. I grope for the phone in the dark.

"Hello?" My eyes are still closed. A little monkey is playing conga drums in my skull. Every time I move, he playes louder. I try to stay still.

"You sound like shit." Is that a hint of glee I hear?

"Thanks. What time is it?"

"Eleven your time." I've been asleep for five hours. Super.

"What's going on?"

"I just got here. She's still here, but now they have her cleaning the ceiling tiles. The reason I called is that there are two people from corporate here." Forgetting my headache, I shoot out of bed onto my feet.

"You think they're going to fire her today?" I pace nervously while my mind races. Is this it? Will they finally get rid of her? Who will the be the new GM? Man, my hardwood floor sure is dirty. Where are my shower slippers? Shit, she's talking again.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"I said 'I don't think so.' They wouldn't make her keep cleaning if they were going to fire her, right?"

"Honestly, I don't know. I'm going to be in my room all day. Call me if something changes."

I hang up the phone. I wonder out of my bedroom into the common room. The light streaming through our lone window hurts my eyes.

My roommate is gently shooing out some girl he picked up last night. She leaves reluctantly. Time for her to embark on the Walk of Shame.

He looks like hell. I figure I probably look just as bad. We look at each other. Without saying a word, we turn and head back to our beds.

---

I'm finally able to get out of bed around 2. My roommate and I head out for lunch at Hoagie Haven, home of the greatest cheese steaks on Earth. We need grease if we're going to rebound for another party tonight. I love college.

When we get back about an hour later, the red light on the phone is blinking. There is a message. My roommate checks first.

"Must be you. My voicemail is empty." He tosses me the handset, plops on the couch, and flicks on the TV. He finds an NCAA basketball game and zones in.

I check my voicemail. Four messages. The first is from my parents. Just checking in. The next three are from my girlfriend.

"Call me back!"
"Where are you? You better not be sleeping! Call me back!"
"I can't believe I can't get a hold of you! You said you'd be in your room all day. Call me back!"

Weird. She's not the type to call and leave a bunch of messages. Hmmm... I pick up the handset and call The Restaurant.

"Thank you for calling The Restaurant, this is Rena speaking, how can I help you?"

"Rena, it's me. Is the woman around?"

"I was wondering when you were going to call. You ain't gonna believe this shit! Here she is."

"Hello? They did it! They canned her ass! HA!" She's screaming into the receiver. My mind goes numb. I recover quickly and start dancing a little jig, laughing hysterically. My roommate watches me with mild interest.

"Tell me everything!"

She launches into the story.

Valerie has been cleaning the place from bottom to top. She was washing the ceiling tiles, but when she got to the final tile, the corporate G-Men stopped her. They lead her over to one of the tables. Nobody can hear anything until Valerie stands up and starts screaming, "This bullshit! You can't fire me! I managing partner!"

Valerie invested some money into the franchise a while back. She gets a percentage of the store's profits.

Apparently, The G-Men anticipated this. They open a briefcase, write her a check, hand it to her, and point her towards the door. She's screaming as she's leaving.

"You can't do this! This bullshit! I sue your asses!"

As she's leaving, still raving, a man walks in. He's about 6'4'', and he looks a bit nervous. The G-Men speak to him for a moment. They then ask the staff to gather in the back.

Once everyone is there, the G-men introduce the tall man as the new general manager, Randy. Then one of the G-men explained what happened.

"The corporate office felt it may be time for a change for this store. When we arrived a few days ago, we realized that The Restaurant was in a lot worse of shape than we anticipated. In fact, it was rotten to the core. We made Valerie clean up her own mess, as you may have noticed. However, we left one ceiling tile untouched." He points to the uncleaned ceiling tile. It's yellow, on the verge of brown. The contrast with the gleaming white ceiling tiles is astonishing. "Every time you look at that tile, I want you all to think about what each of you can do to prevent the same sort of thing from happening."

The G-men pack up their stuff an leave.

In the coming weeks, Valerie's absence was easily noticable. From the associates (servers, bartenders, cooks, busboys, hosts) a mild euphoria permeated The Restaurant. From the managers, astonishment and disgust. Valerie had been doctoring her cost numbers for months. Food cost jumped four points, beverage cost jumped 2. For those of you counting at home, that adds up to about $4,500 in missing food and liquor.

And from me? Well, I'm just amazed at the power of one well-written email.

Valerie Gets Canned- Part I

-Preface-

This is a longer story, so I'm breaking it into two parts. The first will deal with the events leading up to Valerie's firing. The second will deal with the day prior to and the day of her termination.

-A Description of Valerie-

Look in past posts, including The Captain and Valerie, Ranch Dressing, and a Birthday.

-Valerie Gets Canned, Part I-

As you've seen in posts past, Valerie is a tough cookie. By "tough cookie", I really mean "a cold, selfish, unsympathetic, heartless, Napoleonic (Bonaparte, not Dynamite) little wench." The servers hate working with her. She cares little for anything but herself and her bottom line.

Here are some brief examples that reveal the true character of Valerie:

-A server home from school works a six-hour shift. She heads to the back, where she sits outside the office, separating her checks into cash, credit, and other (coupons, comps, etc.).

Tomorrow morning she leaves for Purdue to buy books. She has managed to scrape together $60 on a slow shift, just enough to afford her Econ book. She's hustled on her feet all day. I can tell she's dead tired. She goes into the office to check out with Valerie.

There's a problem. She can't find one of the $2 off coupons. Valerie can let this slide. She doesn't. The server slams her book down on the desk and storms out of the office, heading to the back door. Soon she is knee-deep in the dumpster, looking for the coupon. By some amazing stroke of luck, she finds the coupon. She returns to the office, stinky and bitter. It gets worse.

She counts down her money. She now only has $40. She has to borrow money to get her books.

I can't prove that Valerie took it, but here are several facts that make a good case.

First, the server's book, which included her money, her checks, and her coupons, remained in the office the entire time she was digging through the dumpster. Valerie was the only person in the office.

Second, another server spotted a Jackson stuffed in between two envelopes. She said something to Valerie, who immediately responded, "It fell out of petty cash." Petty cash is kept in the safe, which is on the floor. The lockbox weighs fifty pounds. When the managers take it out of the safe, they just put it on the floor. I find it hard to believe that a twenty fell out of the lockbox, caught an updraft, floated around the office like a feather in the wind, and then slid between two envelopes.

-Valerie counts down my bar drawer. She says it is $20 short. I have to pay it or I get written up. I pay it. I hate getting disciplined for anything. I never got a detention all through school.

Looking at my sales vs. my total tips, I see that I averaged less than 15% for the first time in my serving career. I normally average over 20%. Hmm....

-Less than a week later, she tries the same trick with another bartender. This bartender fights back.

"I counted the drawer before I gave it to you. The money was there, Valerie! Where the hell is it now? You better it soon, and don't try to pull this shit on me again, you hear me?!!" Saucy little bartender, isn't she?

Miraculously, Valerie finds the missing money. Hmm...

Events like these have the staff on the edge of mutiny. People are constantly grumbling, and the staff is getting snippy. We're sick of being verbally and emotionally abused by Valerietnam.

We try to talk to the regional manager. Unfortunately, Valerie is his protege. He hired her as a pantry girl and then brought her up through the ranks, all the way to GM. In his eyes, she can do no wrong. No help is coming from that corner.

Eventually, one of the older bartenders decides to take action. She writes a letter to the corporate office.

Copies of this letter circulate among the staff. As the resident academic, I am one of the first to get a copy. Hiding it in my server book, I read it during a slow lunch shift. I'm pretending to be studying a description of the new chicken and pasta dish. Cloak and dagger all the way, baby.

The letter starts off, "I am a server, a bartender, a cook, a busboy..." and ends with, "It is my firm belief that Valerie's employment with your establishment should be terminated forthwith." In between lay a poorly-written mess of lofty ideals and baseless accusations. The bartender is very proud of her work. I don't have the heart to tell her that the corporate office is more likely to correct it in red ink and send it back rather than take action.

However, the bartender does have some solid evidence. There are photocopies of checks that Valerie adjusted after close. No check should ever be adjusted after The Restaurant's business hours.

The Administrative Assistant deals with all adjusted checks. Apparrently, she started making photocopies of these suspicious checks months ago.

This was Valerie's scam...

She waits until after close. She re-opens checks paid in cash. She comps all the food, pockets the cash, and thinks no one is the wiser. Nobody knows how long she's been doing this.

Just as I predicted, the letter doesn't get a response. In all honesty, I don't see how anyone at the corporate office could respond. The bartender didn't leave a return address or a name. They couldn't call us up and say, "Hello, I'd like to speak to a server, a bartender, a busboy..."

Luckily, I head back to school. I don't want to deal with the political b.s. and all the bitching that goes with it. It makes me cranky.

Every day while I'm away at school, I talk (long-distance) to my girlfriend, who works as a bartender at The Restaurant. Remember the bartender who wouldn't let Valerie scam her? That's my girl. She bitches constantly about Valerie and her surrounding managerial staff. I can tell she's miserable.

Finally, after talking to her until 3 a.m. on a Sunday, I decide to take action. I go on the company website, click on the "comments" link, and go to town. My email letter is short, pointed, and biting. I lay out all I know. The stealing, the attitude, the Regional Manager's lack of action, everything.

At the end, I don't leave my name. If this thing doesn't go well, I don't want to be singled out and screwed over. I leave my school phone number and an offer to talk anytime.

I finish up at 5 am and go to sleep. I drift off wondering if they'll even bother getting back to me, let alone take action...

Ring.... Ring...

What the hell?! I roll over and look at the clock. 8:15. What soulless bastard would call me at 8:15 on a Monday, especially since I don't have class until noon?

"Myelllo...?" I'm groggy as hell. I've only gotten three hours of sleep.

"Hi! My name is (Name Erased to Protect the Innocent), and I'm a Vice President at the corporate office. Are you the one who wrote that email comment this morning?" The voice is chipper. Way too damn chipper for a Monday morning. The man has a slight southern-sounding twang to his voice. Having lived in Texas, I know Southern...and this isn't a Southern accent. I'm guessing Indiana or Ohio farm boy.

"Yes, yes I am. Wow, that was fast!" Now I'm wide awake and excited as heck.

"Well, we've been looking at this situation for a while. We even got a letter a while back, but we couldn't really make heads or tails of it. That wasn't you, was it?"

"Nah, but I read it."

"OK, good. Hey, um, can I ask you... are you still employed with us?" He wants to know if I'm a bitter ex-server out to get the GM who screwed me. Fair enough.

"Yes I am. I'm at school, but I work during the summer and holidays."

"Well then, tell me everything you can about what's going on out there."

I talk to him for an hour. He never rushes me while I speak. He asks good follow-up questions. He even asks for my girlfriend's phone number so he could follow up with her.

His final remark is, "Thank you for your help. Rest assured, we'll take care of the situation." I will always hold respect for this gentleman. His word is as good as gold.

Later that afternoon, I get a call from my fired-up girlfriend. She's at work and she's practically screaming. They fired the regional manager that wouldn't listen to us about Valerie. She said two men in suits breezed through the doors, found the regional (who happened to be at our store at the time), sat him down, and then escorted him to the door.

The new regional manager came in one hour later. Apparrently, she blew in like a hurricane. She immediately sought out Valerie and reamed her over the state of the restaurant.

"Oh. Is she making you guys clean everything in sight?" Now I feel like an asshole.

"No! Not us... Valerie! She's down on her knees scrubbing the walls in the back. I don't know what you did, but it worked! Love you!" She gives a little squeel and hangs up.

I'm stunned. Great, they got rid of one of the problems (the regional was a prick), but what about Valerie? I mean, I'm all about having her wash some walls, but will she still be boss when I go back? Will she know that I caused her all this grief? Will she take it out on me?

to be continued...

Valerie's Food Cost

-Preface-

When running a corporate restaurant, there are only a few quantifiable ways to chart a GM's progress. You can check sales for any given month vs. the sales for the same month last year or the year before. You can check secret shopper scores. (I will describe, in detail, my loathing for shoppers in an upcoming post.) However, the main number that the corporate G-men watch are costs. Food costs and liquor costs, to be specific.

It's a bit complicated to explain, but measuring food or liquor cost involves checking the amount of product sold vs. the amount of product used. These are twisted around mathematically until you reach a number. This number is referred to as your "food cost". It's measured in percentage points. The way The Restaurant calculates food cost means that each point equates to about $500 of waste.

After inventory, you can check food cost for any number of items, from checking the entire restaurant's stock of food used in the last year down to the number of croutons used in the last week.

The corporate office sets goals for every store. If your store doesn't meet those goals, the RM will come down hard on the GM, who will come down hard on the servers. It must be our fault that food cost is so high...

-A Description of Valerie-

See Valerie, Ranch Dressing, and a Birthday

-Valerie's Food Cost-

It's a Saturday morning in the middle of winter. It's freezing outside. It's also snowing. I don't mind a little snow. However, after the first two or three snowfalls, I'm sick of the gray sludge that builds up on the side of the road. The grayness is depressing. I'm ready for summer.

Walking through the front doors, I see Valerie speaking to the servers during our shift meeting. She's wearing a beige peacoat over a gray sweatshirt. Classy. She's also incredibly animated. She keeps thrusting her arm towards the kitchen. For some reason, I think of the old black and white news reels of Hitler addressing Germany.

Shaking my head in an attempt to clear the image from my mind, I sit down in one of the bar booths next to Soldato. His eyes are closed. I prod him and ask what Valerie is yapping about.

He opens one eye. "Cheese," is his simple, hushed answer. I give him a strange look. He smiles and shrugs. His eye closes again. He doesn't even bother to listen to Valerie any more. She's still droning away.

"What the hell do you mean, cheese?" I'm talking out of the side of my mouth in a whisper. Not quietly enough, apparently.

"What you two talking about? I'm glad you decide to show up (I'm five minutes early, actually). Food cost is too high. You need to stop putting so much cheese on the salads. Food cost up 2 points." Valerie manages to be accusatory, demeaning, and stupid all in one breath.

I feel like I'm in 8th grade and I just got caught passing a "check yes or no if you like so-and-so" note. I'm too old for this crap. I'm hungover, the weather is crappy, and I'm in a foul mood. Plus, I don't see how we could have wasted $1,000 worth of cheese in one month by overportioning cheese on salads.

"Valerie, that's ridiculous! Do you know how much cheese we'd need to mound on every salad to screw up the cost so badly?"

I take pride in my work. Since I'm hungover, all mole hills quickly become mountains. Add these two factors together, and I'm steaming.

Valerie must sense my anger. She doesn't yell back at me, nor does she have me lashed for speaking out of turn or insubordination. Instead she answers calmly.

"If you add a little cheese onto each salad, it soon become a lot of cheese. Cheese expensive. Food cost up, Jon (our RM) pissed. Put only a little cheese on salad."

While I agree with this assessment, I still think it's impossible to increase food cost by two points for over portioning cheese. For some reason, I can't let this go. Fortunately, a customer walks in and the shift meeting has to break up.

Soon all the servers are flying around. Dishes are clattering, people are chatting, and The Restaurant is hopping.

I see Soldato coming out of the kitchen. He's got two salads. Each one has five pieces of shredded cheese. The correct portion is one ounce per salad. This is about 25 shreds of cheese. The way these salads were made, it looks as though we're trying to skimp.

"What the hell is that?" I ask Soldato.

"The, uh, Cheese Nazi back there thinks that this is how a salad should look." He holds the bowl up for my inspection. He continues on and places the bowls in front of the customers.

I head to the back. Sure enough, Valerie is watching over the expo line like a prison warden watching inmates on work detail.

"That too much! Take some off! Take off more! Good, now go!" I shake my head and start getting together my food.

Soldato walks back through the door. He's holding a salad.

"Valerie, my customer wants more cheese on his salad." He goes to grab the tongs. Valerie slaps his hand.

"They want more, they pay extra. Ring in 25 cents, open food." Leave it to Valerie. She doesn't care that the customers won't come back. She doesn't mind saving nickels to lose dollars.

The whole shift continues in this fashion. Valerie never leaves her post by the expo line. Finally, I get to cash out and go home for a break before I come back for my night shift.

A quick nap and a short car drive later and I'm back at the doors of The Restaurant. As I'm going in, I see Soldato at the entrance to the kitchen. His jaw is agape. I run up to see what's going on.

"Can you believe this shit?" Now Soldato is talking out of the side of his mouth.

"What is it?" I stop next to him. For the first time, I can see what he's looking at.

Valerie has her hands full with a package of tortillas, a one-pound box of ground beef, a gallon of sour cream, and a gallon of guacamole. She's wearing her coat, scarf, and gloves. She's leaving.

She walks by Soldato and me.

"Valerie, what's wrong with all that stuff?" She stops and looks at me. She has to crane her neck around the gallon jug of sour cream.

"Nothing. It's Taco Night." She turns and walks out the door. With about half a point of food cost in her arms.

I wonder if Taco Night is a weekly event?