Job Growth in U.S. Restaurants and Bars Jumps in March

April 9, 2019 by Leave a Comment

Image result for Average weekly earnings were up to $427.78 per week, as compared to $425.88 per week in February.

Restaurants and bars in the U.S. added 27,000 jobs in the past month, quieting rumblings of an economic slowdown following February’s unexpectedly low job growth numbers for both the industry and the U.S. economy overall. According to the latest economic report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, March’s job growth numbers more closely align with what the industry had been reporting in previous months: 36,000 jobs added in January and 40,000 jobs added last December.

There were 196,000 total jobs added in March across all industries in the U.S., and the unemployment rate stayed at a steady, low rate of 3.8 percent or about 6.2 million people unemployed. Unemployment rates in leisure and hospitality remained slightly above the national rate, at 5.8 percent people unemployed in the industry.

Average hourly earnings in the leisure and hospitality sector remained essentially unchanged from the month prior, at $16.39 per hour. That’s up about 60 cents from March 2018’s average hourly earnings. Employees in the sector worked an average of 26.1 hours per week, the same hourly average that was reported in March 2018. Average weekly earnings were up to $427.78 per week, as compared to $425.88 per week in February.

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Filed Under: Baking, Customer Trends, employees, Events, Global Market Buzz, Opportunities, sales, Wine, Your Restaurant Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Survey: Walmart builds on largest share of grocery loyalty

December 25, 2018 by Leave a Comment

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“Walmart is quickly extending its grocery dominance in brick-and-mortar into the online realm.

Consumer market researcher Packaged Facts said Thursday that 23% of online grocery consumers cited Walmart as the retailer they use most for groceries. That’s second only to Amazon, named by 38% of purchasers, according to Packaged Facts’ “U.S. Grocery Market Focus: The Walmart Shopper” report.

About 27% of in-store grocery purchasers said Walmart is the brick-and-mortar retailer they get groceries from most — over two times as many as Kroger, the next most cited retailer, the study revealed.

In a relatively short time, Walmart has transformed itself into an omnichannel retailer by accelerating investment in e-commerce to develop a seamless shopping experience between its massive store base and digital properties, Packaged Facts noted. What’s more, Walmart has turned its thousands of stores — an apparent cost disadvantage versus pure-play online retailers — into a competitive strength in distribution, the researcher said.”

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Filed Under: Events, Global Market Buzz, Operations, Shopbuzz, Trending Now Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

NYC Issues Guidance to Employers

December 3, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Earlier this year, the New York City Council enacted the Stop Sexual Harassment in NYC Act, as we previously reported in our April 2018 alert and August 2018 alert.

The Act mandates sexual harassment prevention programs for all New York City employers and includes both notice and training requirements. Recently, the New York City Commission on Human Rights released responses to frequently asked questions (FAQs), which provide helpful guidance to employers in complying with their obligations under the Act.

Sexual Harassment Prevention Training

Employers with 15 or more employees and independent contractors at any point within the prior calendar year are required to begin training their employees and independent contractors annually (i.e., every calendar year) as of April 1, 2019. Employers only need to train employees and independent contractors who work more than 80 hours in a calendar year and work for at least 90 days. However, employers are not required to re-train their independent contractors if the independent contractors already received the annual training elsewhere.

The Commission is in the process of developing a free online training program that will satisfy the Act’s training requirements and also comply with New York State’s mandatory anti-sexual harassment training requirements. The Commission intends to make the training available to the public on its website on or before April 1, 2019. Alternatively, employers may create and provide their own annual training (or hire an outside party like employment counsel to do so) as long as the training includes the required elements detailed in the Act, such as:

• An explanation of sexual harassment as a form of unlawful discrimination under local, state, and federal law;

• A description of sexual harassment and examples;

• Any internal employer complaint process available to employees for addressing sexual harassment claims;

• The complaint process available through the Commission, the New York State Division of Human Rights, and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and contact information for these agencies;

• The prohibition of retaliation against employees and examples;

• Information concerning bystander intervention; and

• The specific responsibilities of supervisory and managerial employees in the prevention of sexual harassment and retaliation and the measures they may take to address complaints.

Employers are required to keep a record of all trainings documents, including signed employee acknowledgements that they participated in the required training, for a minimum of three years. Such records must be made available to the Commission for inspection upon request.

Notice Posting

The Act requires employers to post a notice of employees’ rights under the law. The required notice must be posted in English andSpanish in conspicuous locations accessible to all employees (e.g., breakrooms and other common areas). However, if a convenient physical location is not available or electronic posting is the most effective method of reaching employees, the notice may be posted virtually on an electronic bulletin board easily accessible to all employees. If employers have multiple worksites within New York City, they must post the notice at all such sites. If employers have remote workers, they can provide the notice by email.

The notice does not need to be printed in color; a black and white copy satisfies the requirements. The Commission intends to make the notice available in nine additional languages for employers’ use.

Fact Sheet Distribution

In addition to the posting requirements, employers must provide a fact sheet to all new employees at the time of hire and by no later than the end of each employee’s first workweek. The fact sheet can be included in an employee handbook or with other onboarding materials for new employees. It may be distributed by any print or electronic means that employers ordinarily use to communicate with their employees. The fact sheet currently is available in both English and Spanish.

Legal Standard

Finally, the Commission has clarified that the Act does not change the legal standard for gender-based harassment under the New York City Human Rights Law; the existing legal standard remains the same.

For more information about this alert, please contact Carolyn D. Richmond at 212.878.7983 or crichmond@foxrothschild.com, Glenn S. Grindlinger at 212.905.2305 or ggrindlinger@foxrothschild.com, or any member of the firm’s Hospitality Practice Group.

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Filed Under: employees, Global Market Buzz, Heard on The Street, Local Market Buzz, Operations Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Walmart Employees Encouraged To use In-house Apps

November 5, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Walmart Encourages Associates to Perform Tasks with Their Smartphones for Better Efficiency

“Walmart continues its push to empower its employees through technology, now encouraging store associates to accomplish everyday tasks on the job with their smartphones instead of store-supplied devices, with the intent of improving efficiency via familiarity.”

“We know technology is helping our associates be more productive and deliver for our customers in new ways,” said Brock McKeel, senior director of digital operations, on the retailer’s blog. “BYOD is just another option our people will have to access the custom apps that help associates perform their jobs.”

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Filed Under: Operations, Shopbuzz Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

How To Address Lack Of Employee Engagement

September 27, 2018 by Leave a Comment

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“Your culture can propel your profits, sales, employee retention over the goal post or have it fall short. The cost of not making it over the goal line is something any small to mid-size business cannot afford.”

“In the U.S., according to the US Census Bureau, 97.7 percent of all U.S. businesses have fewer than 20 employees. Many of these employees wear multiple hats to keep costs down and profits up.”

“The most recent survey suggested approximately a third of employees are actively engaged leaving two thirds not engaged or actively disengaged. The cost of disengaged employees is estimated to be 34 percent of their salary due to lost productivity, missed shifts, disruption to others, tardiness, etc., Gallup found. Recently I attended a meeting where the CEO asked for some input from his advisers regarding what to do with negative, complaining people. He made the remark several times this was a small thing, but the behaviors of the negative people were hurting his efforts to more the organization forward. He had inherited longtime tenured employees where their beliefs were “We will be here after you leave.”

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Filed Under: Operations Tagged With: , , , ,