Christmas ideas - Joy to the Kitchen

Joy to the Kitchen … the staff has come! Harmony at work is vital for a successful yuletide. If you pay a pittance or let morale fall, you may find that some will go AWOL, as Mark Taylor discovers.

Working throughout the Christmas and New Year period is an

inevitable reality of life in the catering industry. Whether it's in the kitchen or front-of-house, if you work in a food driven pub, the chances are that your name will appear on the rota for most of December - and that includes Christmas Day.

Of course, anybody choosing a career in this business knows that from the start, but when the festive season is in full swing and you find yourself working hard when your friends and family are out enjoying themselves, it can be a tough wake-up call. The upside of working over Christmas is that

long hours mean more money. Staff working Christmas Day in many pubs can expect three or even four times their normal

rate of pay, and that's before the generous tips given by customers who may have had one or two sherries too

many.

For employers, getting staff to work over Christmas can

be a headache, and retaining them is often harder.

Ronnie Rusack has worked in the industry for 40 years, the last 35 of them at the Bridge Inn in Ratho, Edinburgh. His

pub is packed throughout the festive season, with his popular "Santa Cruise" boat trips being an added attraction to Christmas lunches and dinners.

On Christmas Day, he will see about 230 customers arrive at the pub - an operation that demands organisation as well as very high staffing levels.

"Christmas tends to be the time when you can treble your turnover, but it's also the time when people can criticise you more than anything else," says Ronnie. "People always talk to their friends and work colleagues about their Christmas night out. If it's good, you have a great advantage and it can boost trade for the following year, but if it goes wrong, it can ruin your business."

Ronnie adds: "Getting staff on Christmas Day is very hard and it's very difficult to ensure your staff are going to turn up. If somebody's going to throw a sickie then they're more likely to do it on Christmas Day and that could be a huge problem for you.

"You've got to work with them and encourage people to work as part of a team. To them, Christmas may be a fun time, but to us it's vital for business, and if you have a good

Christmas, it helps you survive the quiet winter months of

January and February."

Paying staff three times what they normally earn is commonplace for those working unsociable hours on Christmas Day, but there are other ways of rewarding and motivating them.

Bruce Elsworth, of popular Yorkshire pub the Angel at Hetton, says that the big incentive for his staff is that they always shut for a week in January. They also hold a party for them once the festive season is over.

He explains: "We have a staff party as a 'thank you'. We take the staff out for a day of activities and then a dinner."

Julie Reeman of the Black Horse Inn at Thurnham, near Maidstone, Kent, offers the same incentives to her staff. "Our staff get paid very well and if they work Christmas Day, they'll clear about £100 so that motivates them. We also have a staff party after Christmas where we close for

the evening and everything's paid for.

"Sometimes we take them out for an evening, sometimes we pay for a disco in the pub. We employ about 50 people in

total and they're all invited to the party, from cleaners and maintenance people to front-of-house staff. It's a great teambuilder and motivator."