Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Years Later...

I haven't looked at this blog in years.  And today I realized it still gets some pretty significant traffic.  So I wanted to clear some stuff up about my jobs as a hooters girl.  YES YOU READ THAT RIGHT! JobS, plural...

So here's a very short version of what happened... when I was writing this blog I was a 22 year old college graduate working at a Hooters in Texas.  It wasn't necessarily the establishment's fault, nor my coworkers, it was mine that I didn't like it.  I went in with the attitude that I would hate it.  That I was too good for a job like that. And you know what, I hated it.

Fast forward 2-3 years and I was living in California.  I had $126 in my bank account. I'd made a friend after moving there and she was working at Hooters there.  After hearing how desperately broke I was, she said she could get me a job and I could start working that week.  No one turns down a job like that!  I was in no place to be picky, and my training from before would speed the process along to where I was able to make money.  And amazingly, this experience was new and wonderful!

Now the difference between Texas and California Hooters is pretty large.  In Texas, there's a Hooters on every corner, in every city.  It may as well be another Chili's or T.G.I.Friday's.  In California, it's more of a novelty.  People are coming in for the experience and the TShirts.  They want pictures with the girls and they want to participate in the games.  Also, getting out of the Bible belt helped.  In California, land of the eternal bikini, people don't think twice when you're wearing small shorts and a tight fitting tank top.  Additionally (and probably the most important part of this) is that California's minimum wage was $8 compared to the Texas server wage of $2.15.  So at this Hooters I was making $8/hr PLUS tips!  It was much more my speed when it came to clientele being enjoyable and income I was able to make.

I can't say enough about how wonderful the staff was.  From the 3 managers to the cooks and the bus boys, they were the best employers I've ever worked for!  And I've had A LOT of odds and ends jobs.  To be fair the managers in Texas were also superior.  These people take care of and protect their girls.  I'm sure as a company they are an easy target for law suits, but as far as my experience with them went, they did an excellent job of finding managers to run their stores.

The other nice thing about the California location were the other girls.  Everyone working there was using that to supplement their acting, modeling, film, etc. careers.  We were all willing to switch and cover shifts, help each other out with auditions or networking, and generally everyone there was from out of state and kind to each other.  We were actual friends who hung out outside of work.  And everyone had good things to say about the company.

Years later, my stint as a Hooters girl has long since come to a close.  While it was a great part time job to get me on my feet, my future and career aspirations did not include little orange shorts.  (Not to mention after a certain age, you just don't look the same in them ;)  But overall, though this blog has a lot of my 22 year old, emo, can't-find-myself-in-the-adult-world whining, I would recommend this job to someone who has the confidence and personality for it.  If you are lucky enough to get into a store that has great people, then it can be a lot of fun!

2 comments:

  1. I love it! I recently applied to be a Hooters Girl, and you are so right. They pay no attention to girls who come into the restaurant. I must have stood there a good 5 minutes, before being asked for help.

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