Labor is arguably the biggest challenge facing the restaurant industry in 2018, and it isn’t likely to go away in 2019.
Restaurants have added more than 200,000 jobs over the past 12 months and more than 2 million jobs in the post-recession era.
With the unemployment rate below 4%, and the labor pool increasingly competitive thanks to other growing industries—notably companies such as Uber and Lyft and delivery companies like DoorDash and Grubhub—the cost of labor has skyrocketed. The issue has made it more difficult for restaurants to open and staff new locations and has made high wages, such as $15 an hour, far more common.
In this edition of Restaurant Business' podcast, "A Deeper Dive," Pincho Factory CEO Jayson Tipp talks about how the 10-unit chain is working to attract and keep good employees.
And RB editors Jonathan Maze and Peter Romeo talk at length about the extent of the labor challenges in the restaurant business and what it means for operators in the coming years.
Please have a listen.
This podcast episode is sponsored by CrunchTIme Information Systems.
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