Drove past your Columbia City Indiana location at 4:00pm Sunday 6/2/24, zero customers. Wife, father-in-law and I arrived back at 4:27pm 6/2/24. As we pulled into the facility there were 5 employees behind the building chatting and smoking, still zero customers. They all came inside upon our arrival, we were seated on east side of restaurant. I believe 6/7 additional customers arrived during our visit.
The entire time there 3, at times 4, employees lounged in customer seating area section straight outside door of kitchen (photo supplied). In my opinion, your facility is filthy (photos supplied)! My observance was made, and photos taken, at our seating area. But could easily see the entire seating section was the same. When one observes nearby filth, the cringe about what the kitchen may be like.
My background is manufacturing Plant Management and General Management overseeing multiple facilities. There is no way a customer would observe employees smoking and group chatting outside a filthy facility. Maybe they were on break. Why did they return and the largest part of the group continued to lounge for nearly an hour.
Personally I would close section by section of the facility and those idle time employees would be given constructive tasks. What kind of manager does not have a few minutes every morning to inspect the status of his facility? Photos show really dusty blinds with food splattered onto slats and nasty window sills, disgusting. Just maybe there is a reason for a lack of business at this location, poor management!
Recommendation: Never just allow employees to lounge around, give them constructive task to clean the place up in spare time. What ever happened to a manager developing a group that has pride in being the best they can be.