My chef/husband and I have had many conversations over the years about his salary. Usually the conversation starts because he’s been working so many hours and he’s on salary. (Sound familiar?)
He jokingly tells me how much he makes an hour, which comes out to be ridiculously low with the hours he works. He’s even said a few times that a server went home with more money than him after working 6 hours than he did after working 16 hours, running the entire restaurant and/or kitchen.
When he was a line cook, he occasionally got paid overtime. But as I have come to learn over the years, that overtime kills your labor budget and often the Sous Chef and Executive Chef work extra hours to pick up the slack to save their numbers (especially if those numbers are linked to a bonus.)
My chef/husband has been paid salary ever since he moved up to the position of Sous Chef. I just assumed this was the norm for every chef. But this conversation on Facebook made me curious how many chefs do get paid hourly at the Sous, Executive or even at the Corporate level. I would love to know.
So quick survey in the comments below – what position is your chef in the kitchen and do they get paid hourly or salary?
From one chef’s wife to another,
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When on the line, my chef has been paid hourly but when he’s been in sous positions it’s been salaried. It’s so annoying! He made more money in a lower position because he was being paid 30 hours in overtime every week — alas, with a promotion comes a salary (eg, a pay cut. grr)
Wow! That’s a lot of overtime. On Facebook, someone commented that their husband chose to be a senior sous chef and paid hourly instead of an executive chef on salary because they made more money. I wonder why restaurants allow things like that to happen? It makes no sense to me and is so frustrating!! I agree . . . grr. 🙂
My husband is an executive chef and has been paid only salary in sous and executive chef positions. Yes, he also complains that some of his line cooks and servers often make way more per hour.
So they make more hourly, but they don’t have cool chef coats with their names on them like our husbands! (Sorry . . . sometimes a dumb joke is better than getting angry!)
My husband is currently a Sous Chef, acting as head chef, at a restaurant in Australia. He currently has a salary based on 38 hours a week (a joke right?) but then gets paid overtime by the hour rather than as time in lieu. The reason we did it this way is that we both knew he’d never get to take time in lieu so it was pretty pointless to do it that way.
That being said, because we’re in Australia, things might work a little differently to what they do in the US. Unless you make a name for yourself on tv, a chef salary is almost minimum wage.
Glad he has that option! It would be impossible to take all that time off!
Here in the US, there are so many factors that play into how much a chef gets paid – restaurant size, city and state, popularity of the restaurant, fine dining vs. casual dining, etc.
My chef is paid salary has been any time he has been a sous chef or higher. We try not to think of what it would be hourly if you break it down cause it would suck. LOL
We feel the same way! 🙂
I was getting paid on a 50 hour salary ,running great numbers but working on average 60 hours a week or more , they offered me a performance based bonus that basically required me to hit Christmas numbers 4 times a year to get the bonus which in turn would require more hours to accomplish. Well i got mad and said i want hourly , so now i get paid for every hour i work and get paid about you know …400$ extra every 2 weeks hahaha hahaha …don’t be a chef on salary period
Nice! Lucky you had the option to switch. Hitting Christmas numbers 4 times a year would be tough!!