First Watch Server/Waitress reviews

4.0

69% would recommend to a friend

(38 total reviews)
avatar

Chris Tomasso

73% approve of CEO

25% positive business outlook

Server/Waitress employees have rated First Watch with 4.0 out of 5 stars, based on 38 company reviews on Glassdoor. This indicates that most Server/Waitress professionals have a good working experience there. First Watch is rated in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) by Server/Waitress professionals compared to other employers within the Restaurants & Food Service industry (3.4 stars).

Reviews by job title

38 reviews
4.0
May 11, 2020
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

First watch is such a different environment to be in - in a good way! Your co-workers will have your back no matter what. If you are struggling, asking for help isn’t a problem here! There are no designated hosts at this restaurant ( we are the hosts) so if you are wanting more tables you can seat people in your own section. (I personally love this!) My location is always busy so it isn’t hard to make $100 a day. Management is good - but first watch does relocate them a lot :( so don’t get too close, they will leave faster than you think! There is also no management on the floor during your shifts, if you customers have a problem YOU are welcome to handle it. Which I personally love because, I don’t like feeling insufficient and not being able to take the actions needed to help my own customers. Also no, you don’t get ‘breaks’ but the restaurant is open from 7AM-2:30PM it’ll be ok. You can survive without eating halfway though it. You will always have 2 days off working full time and you’re always out the door by 3:30pm (nights off yay!) Another plus is you and a friend get 50% off the AMAZING food here!!

Cons

As much as I do love this place, there is a con in every restaurant chain. For started this restaurant has a very 70’s vibe in the way we do check writing. We do not enter orders into a POS system to be sent to the kitchen, everything is by hand and with abbreviations. We do enter the order into a POS but that is for their check only. This can be somewhat hard the first few months of working here, you must write down all their modifications and orders AT THE TABLE. If you write checks in the kitchen management will send you back out to the floor to rewrite it in front of your guests. (It’s a learning process and kind of embarrassing but you’ll get it) You do have to Host 1 time per week - we all have to do it. You only make 7.25 plus “$1 per hour” as a tip out. It sucks honestly and I wish they would just hire 16yr olds to host, but it is what it is. Another con is your schedule will never be consistent - which can be hard when you are trying to plan your week in advance!

5.0
Sep 18, 2017

Great company to work for.

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

The training is very detailed and leaves you with few to no issues in transition to serving tables. Both pro but sometimes con is the teamwork aspect of this company everyone helps everyone no matter what in order to give the best experience possible to our guests.

Cons

The "steps of service" sometimes can seem a little pushy for customers to leave and if is a complaint a lot of us servers receive. The teamwork aspect can also hurt the harder working employees, giving full service to a table so another server receives the tip is sometimes a hard pill to swallow.

Viewing 37 - 38 of 38 Reviews

Glassdoor has 1,926 First Watch reviews submitted anonymously by First Watch employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if First Watch is right for you.