Lunch For Success

Business Lunch Etiquette: Interacting with the Wait Staff

Posted on 11. Jan, 2009 by Mark Cornish in Uncategorized

Your clients will form opinions of you by watching how you relate to other people, and at a business lunch your interaction with the wait staff will say a lot. (I’ve heard too many people say, “Well, they are SUPPOSED to serve me…”. Get over yourself.)

Not only do you have an opportunity to show your client the kind of person you are, but the wait staff are a great resource. They know more about the restaurant than anyone. They know the best dishes, they know how to keep a thirsty client’s glass full, they can get your food out to you quickly, and they can get you a seat anytime. If you’re thinking about making a specific restaurant your ‘go-to’ place for important lunches, you must be in good with this thankless crew.

To get on their good side, you need to know how they think. Part of that is knowing what puts you on their bad side, so you can avoid these basic etiquette blunders (remember, etiquette is among the minimum requirements for building social capital).

In The Servers Strike Back, the AOL Food Blog explains the top 11 complaints that servers have about restaurant customers:

From servers:

1. Don’t talk down to me
2. Please don’t camp out
3. We like reciting the specials, but…
   
4. If you can’t tip, don’t eat out
5. Just treat me like a person
6. Tapped out [They have good reasons to ask you if you want bottled water.]
7. Upselling is mandatory
8. I’m being watched [They're not just trying to make more money when they offer a bottle of wine instead of two glasses - they're required to.]
9. Please watch your kids
10. Dealing with change [It simply wastes time if they bring change back to the table unnecessarily.]
11. We’re not the cooks

Some of their points naturally won’t be very relevant for business lunches. For instance, you’re not likely to bring your kids to a business lunch and you’ll most likely pay with a credit card. Still, there’s lots of good, simple insight in there.

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Tags: etiquette, How To, social capital, wait staff