Taco Box uses RestaurantOwner.com Templates to Address Employee Cell Phone and Social Media Abuse

Owner Tom Martin, of TS&S Eateries in Clovis, New Mexico, needed help in controlling his young employees cell phone and social media usage. RestaurantOwner.com provided the solution with complete, comprehensive policies which he customized to address the unique challenges in his operation.

Most operators wouldn't include cell phones and social media among the obstacles to running a successful restaurant - unless of course they had younger employees. But that's where Tom Martin, the owner of TS&S Eateries in Clovis, NM, and operator of two Taco Box restaurants, needed help.

"We had problems with cell phone usage and social media," Martin recalls. "You get a 16-year-old kid who's never been in a work environment and they get to use their cell phone wherever they are. When they come to work they think they can just use their cell phones no matter what. They are waiting on a customer, they are cooking food, they are stocking, and they are on their phones texting, talking, checking the time." Simply telling them not to do it, of course, accomplished nothing. "When they realized they couldn't use their phone on the job, they would take bathroom breaks every five minutes to go check their cell phones."

The fast-food Mexican units in Clovis and Portalis do mostly drive-thru service, with an average per-person check of $7.50 to $8. The units generate a combined $2.6 million in annual revenue.

RestaurantOwner.com proved to be the solution, Martin says. "Within minutes we had complete, comprehensive policies which we customized to our operation. It would have taken us days to produce on our own and we saved by not having to have an attorney review it."

The use of social media on the job led to another "very long, lengthy dissertation" with employees, Martin recounts. "But again, what we picked up off of RestaurantOwner.com was very comprehensive, took into account a lot of things and was really pretty good.

Essentially, what we tell the employees now is, 'Here is (the policy). It's very comprehensive and there are two main things: one is, don't do anything stupid on social media, and two, when you do, leave Taco Box out of it."

The bottom-line result has been fewer employees sneaking around to check their phones and more who respect the restaurant's policies. "They know the rules, and they understand them. I think they are appreciative of the fact that they can use their cell phones on breaks and that, when they actually think about it, they realize it's a reasonable policy."

Crafting workable job descriptions was another task for which Martin turned to RestaurantOwner.com for help. "We were looking for job descriptions for managers and my son and I were sitting here thinking, 'What do we do? What do we say?' Then I snapped my fingers and went to the web site. In two minutes we had the job descriptions."

Indeed, he adds, the site has proven time and again an invaluable resource. "I may not use it once a quarter, but I am happy to pay for it because of all the thought that (Jim Laube, Founder of RestaurantOwner.com) has put into it, and because we don't need to reinvent the wheel. Every time we think we're the only ones who've got a particular problem Jim's got a solution for us."