Ohio restaurants working to overcome labor shortages

Raising Cane's, a Louisiana-based chicken fingers restaurant chain, is expanding into Northeast Ohio at a time when many businesses, large and small, find it hard to fill job openings.

Its second Summit County restaurant opened Tuesday in Cuyahoga Falls, just months after opening its first local one in Macedonia. Raising Cane's now has more than 530 restaurants, including 12 in Northeast Ohio and 33 others elsewhere in the state, with aggressive plans to add another 100 sites next year.

The Falls store is fully staffed, with more than 100 full- and part-time employees, said Michelle Bellanger, area leader of marketing for the company. The store is a "high volume prototype" with a double drive-thru lane.

Hiring and retention are priorities

Still, Cane's, like many other businesses, is working to find ways to attract and retain workers. It recently announced a goal to increase employees from 40,000 to 50,000 over a 50-day period. The company offers what it says are competitive wages, flexible hours "and a culture rooted in appreciation" that helps it in what it acknowledges is a challenging hiring climate.

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"We really want our employees to know they'll be cared for," said Bellanger.

There are a number of reasons for the challenging hiring climate in the restaurant business, say current and former restaurant employees and the head of the Ohio Restaurant Association. (Hiring is an issue in numerous other industries, as well.)

Extended unemployment benefits, which have now ended, were one factor in people opting to delay seeking a job, said John Barker, president and CEO of the Ohio Restaurant Association.

"It's one issue. It's certainly not the only issue," he said. 

Unemployment benefits just one factor

About 35% of people who responded to a recent association survey said the end of the extra benefits did drive more job applications, Barker said.

But other factors are at work, too, with job openings going unfilled, Barker said.

"It's everything from the pandemic changed their life, they got another job in a different industry, they need more flexibility in their schedule, lack of child care or parental care," he said.

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Child care and parental care issues in particular impact single parents, he said. And "there's a tremendous shortage of child care and the medical health field," he said.

The restaurant industry in August experienced its first slowdown in business for the year, Barker noted. Business dropped about 10% in August compared to July, while still stronger than a year ago, Barker said.

"We had an improvement every month of the year from January on. And that's now changed," he said. "Each month kept getting better."

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The increase in business was tied to a rise in consumer confidence and the elimination of many pandemic mandates, he said.

"When we got into August with [the COVID-19 delta variant] rising, that sadly put a pause button on things," Barker said. "It's really all about consumer confidence."

"The point is, the big bounce-back that we were having for quite some time [paused], he said.

More than 3,000 Ohio restaurants have closed

While 2021 has been a recovery year for many restaurants, many of them still lost significant amounts of money, he said. About 3,100 restaurants have closed during the pandemic, he said.

The restaurants that have stayed open "were just starting to scratch the surface on recovery," he said.

The businesses that closed "didn't shut down because they wanted to or forgot how to operate. These were government-mandated shutdowns," he said.

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Retailer Target had a record year in 2020 because it was allowed to stay open as an "essential business," he said. Meanwhile, mom and pop businesses were allowed to gradually reopen under all sorts of restrictions, he said.

"How is that fair? The government was picking winners and losers last year," he said. "Let's help the people that got hurt the worst. It seems fair."

Nationally, the hospitality industry, which includes restaurants, added jobs in September, according to labor statistics released Friday. But the number of new jobs fell well below economist expectations.

Job openings at record levels

Job openings nationally were at a record 10.9 million in July, according to the latest available federal figures that were released last month. August job openings numbers will be out on Tuesday, Oct. 12. The job openings figures always trail monthly government employment reports.

The National Federation of Independent Businesses on Thursday said 51% of small-business owners in September reported job openings they could not fill. That's a record high number for the organization. More than 40% of businesses said they increased compensation, while another 30% planned to raise compensation in upcoming months.

The Ohio Restaurant Association last week said most of the state's restaurants say they are understaffed, with 38% saying they are more than 20% below necessary staffing levels.

Restaurants are coping in part with the labor shortages by reducing hours and days they are open, reducing seating, and also cutting back on menu items, according to the National Restaurant Association.

Finding employees is a top concern for most restaurants, according to an Ohio association survey. Ohio restaurant owners also say food and labor costs are higher than they were before the pandemic.

Ohio restaurant sales in September trended downward from August, with indoor dining places performing the worst, according to an association survey.

People currently working at restaurants, or who have moved on to work in other industries, had their thoughts on why food service jobs are going unfilled.

Restaurant jobs often demanding

"It's a tough job," said Taylor Cook, 22. She has worked at different restaurants and said the jobs are often demanding, unpredictable and typically low paying. She's graduating later this year from the University of Akron with two degrees and is currently a high school student teacher.

The extra federal unemployment aid "absolutely" kept people from returning to restaurant work, Cook said.

Restaurant work also has positives, she said. "You learn amazing skills," she said, that include how to treat people and work with people.

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Karqa Kimesvski worked in the food service industry for six years as a server, hostess and in the kitchen. She's 25 and just got a master's degree in mental health.

"I didn't necessarily hate my food service jobs," she said. "The places I worked, the environment was fine."

But she thinks the extra unemployment money kept many people from applying for open restaurant jobs. "People can make more money on unemployment," she said.

Devin Rogala, 28, said he was laid off from two restaurant jobs in 2020 as the businesses had to cut back. He's been with the restaurant industry for more than 10 years and is currently an assistant manager at a restaurant.

"I enjoy cooking," he said. "It's what I know."

Restaurants can be high-pressure places to work, he said. "In addition to customer demand, it's a melting pot of personalities," Rogala said.

There's no shame now in being laid off and collecting unemployment, he said.

Extra unemployment did play a factor in jobs going unfilled, but the demands of restaurant jobs also play a role, Rogala said. People who are legitimately out of work need unemployment, he said.

Still, there are people applying for job openings.

Shianne Hayes just took at job at the new Raising Cane's in the Falls. The 19-year-old Akron resident has been working at restaurants for two years.

Hayes said she likes the atmosphere and the people she is around. "[I'm] making new friends," she said.

Jim Mackinnon covers business. He can be reached at 330-996-3544 or jmackinnon@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow him @JimMackinnonABJ on Twitter or www.facebook.com/JimMackinnonABJ.