First Day of Training

4 trainers flew out who worked at various Tilted Kilts: Barbie, Sasha, Carol, and Brownie.  Barbie seemed extremely young and doe eyed, I would have guessed her to be 18 but since she ran the bar at her restaurant she had to be at least 21.  Sasha was extremely pretty but wore such heavy eye makeup she looked really mean.  Carol who was in her 30s was pretty but never looked even close to being ‘camera’ ready (even though it was training the trainers were always full on hair and makeup ‘camera ready’), she reminded me more of a soccer mom than Kilt Girl. Brownie (this was a cute little nickname she gave herself) who was almost 40 yet had such a spunky personality that she could pull off being a Kilt Girl.  Kevin was the only one from the corporate office based in Arizona and was pretty cute.  I wondered if his girlfriend was jealous of him always flying around to all the new Kilt openings and being around attractive girls all day long.

The very first night we had to introduce ourselves and do an adjective to our name.   I think that itself, took an hour because there were so many people.  I finally got to see everyone who was hired.  It was a big mix, the girls ranged from stunning to not attractive at all.   

We learned the company slogan which was “A cold beer never looked so good”. The 7 Steps of Service was introduced about what was expected to be delivered with every table.  I’d mention them but I don’t know if they have some sort of copyright on them so I don’t want to mess around with that.  There was a slide show where we were shown Cassie which is the drawing of the red head girl in the Tilted Kilt’s website and marketing photos, essentially a mascot.  I guess she would be what the Owl was to Hooters.  Each letter of Cassie’s name had a positive adjective on how the image of the Kilt Girl was to be portrayed.  After Cassie we were shown her renegade sister, Sassy.  Sassy was a picture of some girl who worked in marketing at corporate dressed in an ill fitting kilt giving a scowl and smoking a cigarette.  Negative adjectives for the letters of her name were used as to how she wasn’t ‘brand appropriate’.    It was a pretty funny and a creative way to get the proper image across.  I was impressed how they organized everything and broke things down for training purposes. 

 

Our trainer Kevin emphasized that the people that came to the Tilted Kilt came to see US.  We were not order takers but relationship builders.  To be a Kilt Girl meant that we were special and we were there to entertain all of our tables as well as anyone else in the restaurant.   Entertaining meant sitting down with your tables and engaging in conversation beyond regular server interaction.  We were to get to know our tables and treat them like they were our friends, play games, tell, jokes, etc. 

This would make the guests feel more taken care of and tip higher than the regular standard 15%-20%. 

He said you’d make the same amount of tips at the Kilt with less tables than you would at a regular restaurant with a bigger station or more tables through the shift because you would be able to give more attentive and more personal service.  The trainers kept emphasizing over and over again people went there to see US.  WE were special and IMPORTANT.  I can see how this could get to some people’s head when they took it outside of work. I’ve worked in a few restaurants before and am already used to juggling tables and being fast so this sit down thing is all new for me. 

Theresa told us that at the end of the night we would try on our uniforms in front of corporate (the trainers) and that they would be doing the first cuts.  It gave me flashbacks of sorority rush.  She said the cuts were based on who corporate didn’t feel fit the brand image.  Is this normal?  It seems to me that if they weren’t the brand image they wouldn’t be hired in the first place, wouldn’t that make more sense?  I guess they meant something like corporate knows who is right and who isn’t but I’d give the manager the benefit of the double in who she chooses to hire as being deemed brand appropriate.  Theresa said she’d have to call people later that night to tell them if they didn’t make it.  It all sounded very Draconian.

We got in uniform and lined up in our uniforms to what seemed like forever because there were so many people.  I was there at least 40 minutes.  I saw Leanne again who was talking up a storm with everyone.  So far she was the most energetic girl I met, perfect for the Kilt.  I didn’t notice before but this time in the costume I saw a huge tattoo on her neck.  The Tilted Kilt unlike Hooters allows tattoos.  Hooters claims to represent the All American girl.  Well the All American girl has changed.  I feel more girls under the age of 25 have some sort of tattoo than not.  I praised the Tilted Kilt for not being so old fashioned about that policy.  That being said though I saw a lot of gaudy unflattering tattoos.  Some covered the whole stomach and I saw a few arm sleeve tattoos.   Some girls actually looked more appropriate for a rough biker bar than a casual ‘family style’ restaurant. 

When we got up to the trainers they eyed us up and down like a designer evaluating the models to see how the clothes fit then wrote down our size and we were done.