Restaurant Workers Survey: What 10K Workers Said

What 10,000 Restaurant Workers Said About Their Jobs

This restaurant workers survey includes responses from 10,000 hourly and salaried BOH and FOH hospitality professionals about their employment experiences during the 2021 labor market disruption.

The data highlights concerns about pay, scheduling, working conditions, and long-term career opportunities. For broader employment context, see the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics hospitality employment trends.

What the Restaurant Workers Survey Reveals

The survey collected 10,000 responses, including comments about compensation, schedule stability, management, and workplace conditions.

Respondents described concerns extending beyond wages, including unpredictable schedules, unclear expectations, and difficult working environments. These observations provide historical context for Why Hiring Problems Continue After Wage Increases.

The feedback also illustrates why hiring and retention deserve attention beyond compensation, including the role of consistent onboarding practices.

Employment Trends in Hospitality

This section examines the survey's findings about hospitality professionals who remained employed and those who had stepped away from the industry during the 2021 reopening period.

The responses also highlight changing expectations around pay, scheduling, working conditions, and long-term career opportunities.

Why Some Workers Hadn't Returned

Among respondents who were not working at the time, reported considerations included:

• Difficulty finding the right opportunity

• Concerns about returning to hospitality employment

• Unemployment benefits or transitional income

• Personal circumstances and other industry-related factors

These responses help illustrate the different considerations workers faced during the 2021 reopening period. They should not be interpreted as the reasons all hospitality workers remained unemployed.

What Hospitality Workers Said in Their Own Words

The following survey graphic preserves the open-ended feedback collected by Mis en Place on July 3–4, 2021.

Worker feedback and sentiment from the July 2021 Mis en Place survey.

Key Takeaways

The survey collected 10,000 responses, including comments about compensation, scheduling, management, and working conditions.

The written feedback shows how differently hospitality professionals experienced their workplaces during the reopening period.

Some respondents wanted better pay or more predictable schedules. Others emphasized management practices, training, respect, and opportunities for professional growth.

These individual comments provide valuable context, but they do not establish how widely each concern was shared across the full survey population.

What This Means for Restaurant Hiring

The 2021 feedback offers a useful reminder that compensation is only one part of the employment experience.

Clear responsibilities, realistic schedules, respectful management, and thoughtful onboarding can also influence how employees evaluate opportunities.

For restaurant operators, the practical lesson is to communicate expectations before hiring and follow through after employees join the team.

For a related breakdown, see our structured hiring process for restaurants.

These historical challenges are also discussed in How to Survive the Restaurant Industry Labor Shortage.