CHARLOTTE, N.C. — With restaurants facing unprecedented staffing shortages, they’re turning to a younger part of the workforce to make sure they can keep serving customers: teens.
Park Road Soda Shoppe is used to having teens behind the counter, but suddenly restaurants across our area are also putting the next generation to work because they have to.
At 15, Sloane Poth is the youngest worker there.
"This is my first job. I’ve done babysitting and house sitting and pet sitting but this is my first official weekly daily job," she said.
The Myers Park High School student is grateful for the gig, and her bosses are grateful for her as restaurants across the area continue to struggle to staff up.
Remy Thurston works with the FS restaurant group. They own 10 restaurants across Charlotte but only hire teens at their Yafo Kitchen locations.
"The more hands we have the better customer service we can provide. Yafo is definitely seeing better numbers than some of our other restaurants because of that," said Thurston. "We are less stressed for labor at Yafo Kitchen than the other restaurants."
Jossie Lucacik runs Sweet Spot Studio and has two teens who were students who have now become full-time employees.
"Some people may think teenagers, they’re gonna be lazy but if anything they work harder than everyone else," she said. "I think the younger you are you’re like a sponge and it’s so easy to teach and when people come in green you can train them to be exactly how you want them to conduct themselves in the kitchen."
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Poth agrees.
"I’m learning to stay on task and do all the things I need to do and all these people giving me a chance has let me see what the world of working is like and I really like it," she said.
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