Special occasions at restaurants should feel smooth and memorable for guests.

The following story is about an employee working as a sommelier during a busy Mother’s Day shift.

The restaurant was understaffed, and the kitchen couldn’t catch up, so she had to juggle multiple roles.

As complaints piled up, she felt frustrated that she couldn’t deliver a better experience to mothers and families celebrating.

Let’s take a closer look!

Mother’s Day…

I am currently a sommelier. Until February of last year, I had been serving for a long time.

Tonight was an absolute crap show. I work at a nice upscale place.

It is not quite fine dining, but close. It is in a trendy area of NYC.

We are the flagship restaurant for my hospitality group.

The restaurant was understaffed during Mother’s Day.

We were understaffed. I honestly feel embarrassed about the service we provided tonight.

For a lot of these moms, this was probably the one gift they were getting from their family.

It was a nice meal out. It felt like we had a hand tied behind our backs.

We were understaffed. They have been doing this staggered-in-time thing.

They are trying to save on labor costs.

Many servers were even on a break.

For the first 30 to 40 minutes of service, most of the servers were on break.

So it was me, the somm, and the two new managers taking tables.

We were also grabbing bottles for tables. I was also doing my somm duties.

It was a lot. And of course, because it is Mother’s Day, the first turn at 5 p.m. is the busiest.

This woman warned the management about how busy they might be, but she was ignored.

Last week, I warned upper management.

They should staff today differently because of this. They did not listen.

On top of it all, the kitchen was not keeping up.

Ticket times for entrees were like 45 minutes to one hour.

She felt bad that she couldn’t give mothers the service and the day they deserve.

Because I am a somm, I am dressed like a manager in a blazer.

Every table was flagging me down to complain.

I may be dressed nicely, but I am an hourly employee.

I am in the tip pool at the same exact rate as the servers.

I was a somm, server, and manager-lite tonight. It just sucked.

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These moms deserved a better night out. I feel crappy that I could not make it happen.

She clearly cared about the guests and wanted them to have a great experience.

The problem was not a lack of effort, but a lack of support and planning from management.

One employee can only do so much when an entire system is struggling.

If you enjoyed this post, check out this post about a hardworking employee whose management refuses to give them one single break.

Let’s check out the comments of other people on this story.

This user shares their personal thoughts.

Here’s something nice to say.

It’s management’s failure, says this user.

This person makes a valid point.

Finally, this one makes sense, too.

When the restaurant is understaffed, even the best wine can’t solve the problem.