First off, tips are “shared.” So expect lots of drama when it comes to getting paid. Servers are constantly fighting over who gets what, and the Notos skim off the top for their own amusement.
The Notos have notoriously unstable personalities. They act like infant tyrants in their little kingdom. Expect frequent melt-downs, verbal abuse, and for management to make you feel unwanted and like you owe them.
Working events, especially for the banquet service, is terrible. The events are planned haphazardly at the very last minute and are often over-booked and under-staffed, so expect to be running around behind the scenes to multiple events and under-prepared. Guests usually notice the lack of assistance and poor timing from staff and become frustrated with poor service.
Working in the restaurant is equally abysmal if not worse because guests are paying exorbitant prices for sub-par food and service. They are drawn in by luscious images from the internet and television , often staged in the cellar by professional videographers with table-side service from a personal chef. Yeah, right.
The dated dining room is requite with faux sculptures and tacky tapestries and it’s not what guests are expecting. Enter frumpy, cocky servers dressed in awkward, dated uniforms into a nearly empty, cold, and expansive dining room and you’re starting to get the picture. The tables and chairs are cheap, old and creaky and the cutlery is scratched to pieces from banquets. It’s a dump with linen table-cloths.
It’s not haute cuisine, as the Notos say, either and the food and is a far-cry from from the experience that is advertised, so don’t expect gourmet as the guests do, or for them to tip or to smile. Nearly everything the kitchen prepares is warmed up from a pre-cooked recipe from a bag or is previously frozen and shelf-stable for the cook’s convenience and to keep “labor costs down.”
Often, the regulars are retirees dining on ancient coupons from the Notos heyday over a decade ago, so don’t expect a tip either. Tips are often under 10%, and honestly, I never blamed them because the restaurant, like everything the Notos are involved in, is a swindle.
