Upper Crust Legal Problem

[Pete-zza]

I know that several of our members in the Boston area have mentioned the Upper Crust pizza operation. According to the report at http://articles.boston.com/2011-10-12/business/30271706_1_civil-lawsuit-grand-jury-immigrant-workers, Upper Crust is involved in legal proceedings that are immigration related.

Peter

[BrickStoneOven]

It's so sad that owners take advantage of their employees like that. I saw a video a little while back that someone made about all the things that UC was doing to their employees. If you go into a UC every single BOH is brazilian, the only people who weren't brazilian were FOH employees. I guess the workers were working 60+ hours a week and they wouldn't get payed overtime. So they took the owner to court and won like it said in the article and got paid $341K. Then the owner cut all the hours of the BOH so he could make back his money. A "well known" food blogger in Boston protested Phantom Gourmet because UC is a major sponsor of PG. The PG owners(3 brothers) would make fun of and talk about the UC situation in support of UC. In the last year and half/two years they've been going down hill anyways.

Edit: The video

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPN4a4QSclo" target="_blank" class="aeva_link bbc_link new_win">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPN4a4QSclo</a>

[dellavecchia]

I go to the UC in Wellesley sometimes, and the pizza is average at best. The calzones are good. But after reading about this I am done with them - how far will you go with someone's livelihood to make money?

Old School Pizzeria opened a few doors down from UC in Wellesley and I have yet to try it out:

http://ospizza.com/

John

[Hdale85]

All these small chains always want to grow, just too much greed I think. If I ever opened a pizzeria I would never grow more then a few stores near me just so I can visit regularly and make sure things are the way they should be. Franchising is what's killing off all the small businesses out there. It's so much harder to open up a mom and pop restaurant then just jumping on the franchise bandwagon. I imagine them getting greedy and wanting to grow is what started their shady practices is my guess and what my point is.

[BrickStoneOven]

They aren't franchise though, that guy owns all of them.

[Hdale85]

But there is no way he can really stay on top of 18 stores. That's too big for a single owner if you ask me. And he was looking for investors to grow more still! That's just crazy.

[aawshads]

I disagree.  If the owner is smart, and hires competent people to help him run the stores, and then holds them accountable to the standards he has set, then the restaurants will be successful.  It all trickles down from the ownership and what procedures he/she has put in place.  I work for a company that has franchisees.  Franchises are best for people who want to open a restaurant but do not understand the intricate nature of the costs and methodology that must be followed to make a restaurant successful.  They will give the training and support, and usually have some form of cost savings from national or regional buying power that helps to offset any royalty fees.  I have been a chef/restaurant owner operator for 20 years, and I have seen many people try restaurants and fail on their own because they had no clue. 
On the other side, for anyone that does have a clue franchises limit your creativity and do have additional costs involved, if I opened a new restaurant tomorrow I would not be a franchisee.  That all being said how this company is treating individuals is deplorable.

[Hdale85]

Well you can feel you've hired a competent manager and still end up with a bad one or even one that changes over time and becomes bad which is likely what happens pretty often as people start to dislike their jobs. Can't really guarantee that someone will stay as competent as they were when you hired them and if you have 18 stores it makes it pretty hard to stay on top of all the managers along with everything else you have to do when owning that many restaurants.

[elephant man]

I don't know how Starbucks does it but, I an impressed. Been to six different countries and I get the same warm feeling in all the Starbucks.