Today's kids are tomorrow's customers
Nettie’s House of Spaghetti in New Jersey, USA, recently banned children less than 10 years from its dining room by posting the following on social media.
“Between noise levels, lack of space for high chairs, cleaning up crazy messes, and the liability of kids running around the restaurant, we have decided that it’s time to take control of the situation.”
Wonder if Nettie’s will be checking birth certificates at the entrance. At a time most restaurants are spinning out their story to encourage parents to bring kids to their restaurant, especially after the harrowing passage of COVID-19, a total child ban is both controversial and a rarity.
More often than not, dining establishments play it safe by having a menu that is child unfriendly. Certain restaurants simply can’t handle it and one can’t fault them to some extent, because there are parents who are oblivious or don’t do anything when their kids use the restaurant as a playground.
Our son and our daughter-in-law have been taking their kid to restaurants from the time he was ten weeks old. As parents they had resolved that whenever possible, they were not going to leave the child at home when they went out to dine. As grandparents, my wife and I totally agreed with their decision.
In this very self-centered world of “heads down, headphones in” culture, tolerating other people’s kids in restaurants so that they learn to be well behaved people is one of very few remaining community-related child-rearing engagements, and we firmly believe it should be encouraged.
So how can you ensure that dinner equates to lovely moments and not tantrums?
As kids grow, familiarizing them to restaurants at an early age might be an approach that teaches them to take certain cues and to learn good manners. The restaurant is a good place for parents to teach their kids how to be people around other people. After all, kids are simply little people and future customers.
It behoves parents to ensure that dinner connects to pleasurable moments - not just for themselves, but to other patrons in the restaurant as well as the wait staff.
Restaurateurs need to navigate how to be family-friendly and still accommodates the rest of the crowd. I.e. attract families with kids, those couples and the celebrative crowd that is exuberant and boisterous to the point of being unruly. Dining has never been a matter of an individual's experience - it's a collective one. The contrast and even the traction between different people—young and old, loud and quiet, all existing in the same space - represents a restaurant at its best. Leaving kids out of the equation (with certain exceptions such as in upmarket fine dining places) is simply awful.
Of course, even after providing the right dining environment and offering all of the amenities, the task of keeping a toddler occupied and content at the restaurant lies with the parents. There are of course times when staff can step in to keep a child happy. I’ve witnessed several waitresses on various occasions do exactly that to my grandson. Such staff have earned the parents gratitude and equally importantly, earned us as repeat customers.
In the end, a successful dinner out is all about mutual respect and some patience - not least of all tipping the extremely child-friendly server who took care of your family, generously.
Shafeek Wahab – Editor, Hospitality Sri Lanka, Consultant, Trainer, Ex-Hotelier
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