DALLAS The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has reached a $1 million settlement with the 11-unit Razzoo’s Cajun Cafe chain of Irving, Texas, in a sex-discrimination case involving male bartenders.
The EEOC claimed that Razzoo’s refused to hire or promote men to the position of bartender in its restaurants. The company admitted no guilt and said it settled the case to avoid the expense of a trial.
In the settlement, Razzoo’s will pay $775,000 to as many as 80 male applicants, servers and bartenders and spend at least $225,000 for human resources programs.
The EEOC contended Razzoo's management set up and communicated to managers by e-mail a plan for an 80:20 ratio of women to men behind the bar.
“Men who worked as servers at the restaurants were generally denied promotion to bartender because of their gender,” the EEOC said in a press release. “The few men who were promoted to bartender were not allowed to work lucrative ‘girls-only’ bartending events.”
The agency said sex discrimination violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Suzanne M. Anderson, lead EEOC counsel in the case, said: “Some may think that sex sells drinks, but gender ratios are illegal.
“Razzoo’s decision to hire and promote by gender is a clear violation of federal law,” Anderson said. “A hiring ratio is illegal whether it is 80:20 whites to blacks or 80:20 women to men.”
Razzoo’s has units in the Texas cities of Dallas, Fort Worth and Houston and in Concord, N.C.
Last year, Razzoo’s reached a settlement with a former waitress who was a Jehovah’s Witness who claimed she was forced to sing “Happy Birthday” to guests in violation of her faith.