🌭 How Hotdog Moments Transform Employee Experience

Lessons from Will Guidara's “Unreasonable Hospitality” and our Favorite Restaurants

May 03, 2023

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In an elegant dining room in a four-star restaurant in the heart of NYC, waiters wear suits and tablecloths are pressed to perfection. Well-known for its tasting menu where food is presented like fine art, Eleven Madison Park typically serves gourmet dishes like “honey-lavender glazed Muscovy duck that has been dry-aged for two weeks.” But, unexpectedly serving an ordinary NYC hotdog transformed their approach to hospitality.

After overhearing a table of tourists talking about their trip, co-owner Will Guidara described the moment that changed his career in this TED Talk. The visitors had tried many iconic NYC restaurants but missed out on tasting a classic NYC hotdog. Will recounts calmly rushing back to the kitchen, running out the back door and racing to the hotdog cart on the corner.

When he returned with the $2 order, Will had to convince the chef to serve the hotdog — thankfully the chef obliged with creative “swooshes” of ketchup and “a quenelle of relish.”

As Will Guidara introduced the dish to the surprised guests, he said: “to make sure you don't go home with any culinary regrets, a NYC hotdog." He reflected on what this experience taught him in his TED Talk:

At that point in my career, I had served thousands of dishes and many, many, many thousands of dollars worth of food. And I can confidently say that no one had ever reacted to anything I served them better than they reacted to that hotdog. Each person said it was not only the highlight of their meal, but of their entire trip to New York, and they'd be telling the story for the rest of their lives.
That hotdog changed the way I approach restaurants from that point forward. Because up until then, I had been so focused on excellence, on all the little details that go into making a meal great, that I somehow hadn’t realized something really important: That in restaurants, our reason for being is to make people feel seen. It's to make them feel welcome. It's to give them a sense of belonging. See, in restaurants, the food, the service, the design, they're simply ingredients in the recipe of human connection. That is hospitality.
And I realized, if we could be unreasonable in our pursuit of that, we could give people the kind of experiences they would remember forever. It was only then that I realized I wasn't actually in the business of serving people dinner. I was in the business of serving them memories.

What would work feel like if we created more of these hotdog moments to surprise and delight our guests — the employees? Whether it’s a MICHELIN Star restaurant, your favorite family-owned pub or the classic diner that always serves your favorite hash-browns the same at any hour of the day or night, how can we cook up “above and beyond” hospitality experiences at work? It’s possible without breaking the bank, Will Guidara explains:

It does not take a big budget to start infusing this into your culture, because remember, it's not the cost of the gesture that matters. It's how it makes people feel.

Here are five other restaurants offering hotdog moments and what we can learn from them:

🥪 Zingerman’s: Welcome Guests Back and Thank the Thankers
🗽 Emma's Torch: Hire Thoughtfully and Encourage Taste of Home
🚌 The Grey: Reimagine the Past and Embrace the Hard Conversations
🧇 Waffle House: Focus on the People and Support Your Community
📮 The Lost Kitchen: Share Stories of Resilience

🥪 Zingerman’s: Welcome Guests Back and Thank the Thankers

Since 1982, Zingerman’s has been inspiring and feeding Ann Arbor, Michigan with classic sandwiches, baked goods and artisanal foods. They even offer hospitality training courses which I took in 2019.

The Zingerman’s staff greets guests with “When was the last time you were in?” to make them feel welcome. Research led them to this phrase that assumes visitors have been there before rather than asking if it’s their first visit — who wouldn’t want to feel like a regular?

To recognize colleagues who go above and beyond, Zingerman’s created the “Extra Mile Files.” They also honor the people who nominated them. It encourages a culture of celebrating successes. I already believed in the power of saying thank you, but this takes it to a whole new level.

🌭 Hotdog Moments: Make every employee feel like a regular. Listen carefully to your customers. Create a culture of gratitude for all by sending cards and encouraging smile files.

🗽 Emma's Torch: Hire Thoughtfully and Encourage a Taste of Home

Named in honor of the quote at the base of the Statue of Liberty, Emma's Torch is both a restaurant and culinary training program “empowering asylum-seekers through education, by training them for jobs in the food service industry.”

As a non-profit recruiting diverse employees who all share the common and frightening experience of fleeing their homes, Emma’s Torch builds community through the dishes of many traditions. Learn More.

🌭 Hotdog Moments: Embrace mission-driven work and celebrate that impact. Hire diverse talent and invite them to share their traditions through cooking classes or stories. Consider celebrating every holiday with your team, culinary style.

🚌 The Grey: Reimagine the Past and Embrace the Hard Conversations

Based in Savannah, Georgia, The Grey is located inside a 1938 art deco Greyhound Bus Terminal that Johno Morisano and Chef Mashama Bailey partnered to restore. The result — beautiful design meets multiple James Beard Awards.

Initially, the founders did not discuss the difficult topic of race, but eventually, they began sharing their stories with each other and published Black, White and Grey — “a story about the trials and triumphs of a Black chef from Queens, New York, and a White media entrepreneur from Staten Island who built a relationship and a restaurant in the Deep South, hoping to bridge biases and get people talking about race, gender, class, and culture.” Learn more.

🌭 Hotdog Moments: Tap into historic moments for unique and unexpected conversations with your employees. Give your employees the space to engage in difficult conversations.

🧇 Waffle House: Focus on the People and Support Your Community

With 2,000+ locations in 25 states, Waffle House serves an estimated “127 cups of coffee, 341 strips of bacon, and 145 waffles per minute...Menu items are named after real people who worked there, like Bert’s Chili and Alice’s iced tea,” according to a 2019 feature in Maxim.

Employees attend Waffle House University where they learn about running a restaurant and “a three-hour personality-profiling class on how to bring out the best in people. As they like to say at Waffle House: It’s all about the relationships” according to “How Waffle House became a cultural icon” in Atlanta Magazine.

Waffle House is known for being there, even when the lights are flickering — FEMA created an Index to evaluate how bad a storm hits a community — if Waffle House stays open or reopens quickly, it’s a good sign. Waffle Houses are prepared with generators and staff support ready to arrive after the blizzard, tornado, hurricane or any natural disaster that strikes.

🌭 Hotdog Moments: Be Authentic. Serve “Good Food Fast.” Get to know your people and name ideas in their honor. Care for your colleagues as you would a community. Check-in when there are disasters and create a fund for emergency support.

📮 The Lost Kitchen: Share Stories of Resilience

Founder and Chef Erin French never imagined she’d find herself again in her hometown. After dropping out of college when she became pregnant, being in an abusive marriage and battling a drug addiction, she persevered to open The Lost Kitchen. The restaurant has helped Erin find her way again through local food, an incredible 12-course meal and a staff of friends. Learn More.

In her memoir, Finding Freedom, Erin shares “stories of multiple rock-bottoms, of darkness and anxiety, of survival…Erin’s experiences with deep loss and abiding hope, told with both honesty and humor, will resonate with women everywhere who are determined to find their voices, create community, grow stronger and discover their best-selves despite seemingly impossible odds.”

🌭 Hotdog Moments: Leaders should share their stories and struggles transparently. Foster a culture where it’s okay to talk about failures.

These hotdog moments happen often in hospitality. Here’s what leaders featured on The Switchboard shared about their favorite restaurants and what we can learn from them:

My favorite restaurant is Philippe in NYC. I’ve been going there since it opened in 2004. I love it because the food is delicious and consistent, the waiters always know my usual order (even if they are new) and it's always fun/easy. Like Philippe, good communicaitons is always clear, consistent and engaging regardless of the circumstances. -Tiffin Jernstedt

Besides being delicious and consistent from location to location, In-n-Out Burger pays homage to its SoCal roots without an over-the-top menu. It’s a great brand with an overall vibe that makes you feel good. Of course, for the fans, there is a hidden menu, making it special to eat there. We can learn from its consistency, simplicity, and authenticity. They know what they do and they do it well. Customers go there expecting the same quality and experience, which is one that I really love too! -Holly Nicola

Virginia’s is a place I’ve counted on for an exceptional hamburger, unpretentious atmosphere and service that prioritizes its patrons above everything else. I’ve taken my friends to Virginia’s and I’ve taken my wife to Virginia’s, and I’d recommend it to anyone looking for a great dining experience. There’s a dependency and quality that’s obvious from the moment you’re seated at your table. -Eric Gonzalez

Hotdog moments and Unreasonable Hospitality aren’t only good for business and customers, it’s good for employees too. In Will Guidara’s TED Talk, he concludes:

With these gestures and so many more, our guests were obviously happier than ever, but you know what? This is the cool part, so was our team. Because for the first time, they had creative autonomy. They were no longer just helping to execute someone else's vision, serving plates of food someone else had created. They were coming up with their own ideas, and those ideas were affecting the guest experience. They were empowered. But mostly, I mean, we were all just happy because we were making other people really, really happy.

So, I hope you relish today and ketchup tomorrow with great internal communications and meaningful employee experiences.

The Switchboard