Restaurants leverage holiday hiring push

Seasonal push, year-round benefits

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Chains like Boston Market are also cognizant of the need to keep as many of its new hires around after the holidays as possible, to mitigate the expensive effects of turnover and to leverage those workers’ talents in the restaurants’ plans for 2013.

Boston Market is always trying to retain year-round the benefits of its additional employees trained to work the dining rooms during the busiest time of the year, Miller said. This has become even more important during the past two years, as Boston Market has implemented many new guest service initiatives that have led to sales growth, he said.

“The brand has undergone a big transformation the past two years, and as a result we need more people and folks who can work our dining rooms,” he said. “We have so many people coming to the restaurant who haven’t seen us in a while, and we’re hoping to derive the benefit of them coming back because they’re noticing the difference in the better Boston Market.”

As such, there is no “mass exodus” of seasonal employees, but rather a gradual, natural attrition, he said, “as people go back to school or move on to more normal work times for them.”

Because the seasonal hiring happens weeks before Thanksgiving, the additional staff for Boston Market ends up being more than college students home on break, Miller added. Many of Boston Market’s new delivery drivers also deliver for other restaurants and fill their daytime hours with the 476-unit chain, as do some other people with a hole to fill in the middle of a workday, like school bus drivers, he said.

Brandon of Domino’s added that the brand uses a seasonal-hiring strategy to “attract and keep team members who are looking for longer-term opportunities,” as well.

“At the very least,” he said, “we’d prefer to keep those seasonal team members on board through Super Bowl Sunday and beyond.”

Contact Mark Brandau at mark.brandau@penton.com.
Follow him on Twitter: @Mark_from_NRN