Leonard St. Restaurant Consortium Announces $15 Minimum Wage For Staff
In a social media announcement this week, a group of four restaurants/breweries located on Leonard St. in Grand Rapids announced that they would raise the minimum wage for staffers to $15 an hour.
The restaurants, including The Mitten Brewing Co., Long Road Distillers, Two Scotts Barbecue, The Peoples Cider Co., and The Comedy Project GR, will all be guaranteeing a $15 an hour wage for all hourly paid staffers.
For servers who also make tips, the restaurants will guarantee an equivalent compensation of at least $15 an hour. If the tips come up short, the restaurateurs have pledged to make up that difference.
In the post, signed by the management and owners of the individual businesses, they say they are committing to a living wage for their staffers:
The pandemic has brought about countless changes, particularly in the hospitality world. Across the country, closer relationships between the people who own restaurants and the people who work in them have been forged. Our teams in particular have astounded us with their resilience, adaptability, and loyalty, and we are forever indebted to them. So, today we commit:
The Mitten Brewing Co. (all locations), Long Road Distillers (all locations), Two Scotts Barbecue, The Peoples Cider Co. and The Comedy Project GR will guarantee $15/hr compensation for their employees...We realize this is a small step toward building a better hospitality workforce and we know we have much more work to do, but in the meantime, EVERYONE DESERVES A LIVING WAGE.
Currently, the minimum wage in Michigan is $9.45 an hour, but many businesses have been having trouble staffing at that wage as employees have re-evaluated their priorities during the pandemic.