With more than 400,000 seats a year, the Grands Buffets are a global showcase of the cuisine of chef Auguste Escoffier. At the head of it for more than 30 years, Louis Privat has turned it into a true social laboratory to test new models of work organization that are more respectful of the well-being of hotel and restaurant workers. A method that seems to bear fruit: its all-you-can-eat buffet concept was awarded this week by the List, the world guide to the best culinary addresses, for its commitment to the preservation and valorization of French culinary heritage.
A solution to “the crisis of the profession”
At the beginning, the Grands Buffets had a classic organization with 2 days of rest per week and the establishment decided, last year, to introduce 4 days of work per week. But it didn’t stop there: the restaurant presented a new internal organization for 2025 that will reduce the work week to 3.5 days with 3.5 days of rest.
“This measure is part of a global social logic that is not from yesterday,” says Louis Privat, who is proud to have been the first restaurant to adopt the 35-hour week in 1998, two years before Lionel came into force. . The Jospin reform in 2000 (Aubry law) that made it mandatory in France. “I didn’t understand the attitude of the professionals of the time,” he explains. “Of course, the establishment has to bear an economic burden, but the gain in well-being at work is not comparable.”
The latter employs more than 220 people – in the dining room, in the kitchen, but also for maintenance and administrative tasks – and is glad to have never received any request for a salary increase. “We must put an end to drudgery, because restaurant employees too often sacrifice their family or relationship life,” laments Louis Privat.
A sacrifice that did not seem to bother the talents of the sector “in the time of Auguste Escoffier.” “But it is this situation that is causing a crisis in the profession today and the hiring problems do not date back to the health period,” he explains. “How can you convince a young person today to work in the evenings, on weekends and during school holidays?”
Imposing a “fair price”
To successfully complete this transition, the restaurant plans to hire between 12 and 14% more staff, allowing the entire team to benefit from an additional half day per week. While this system will initially benefit butlers and waiters, it cannot be ruled out that it will spread to other professions if it is successful. On the other hand, Louis Privat tries to reassure the profession: “we refrain from hiring profiles that work for our competitors.”
The main challenge will continue to be organizing the chaos at different times. “A simple technical variable”, according to Louis Privat, who intends to “trust artificial intelligence” to navigate better. “Precise management tools” necessary when “making decisions that concern people.”
This is not a question of establishing “a 3.5-day week”, but rather a 3.5-day week with the same salary level as a 35-hour week. “There is no miracle recipe; if a company wants to defend a social model, it must be able to charge for it,” explains Louis Privat. In other words, you must be able to impose a “fair price” on your customers so that this is reflected in salaries.
Maintain salary levels
At the same time, the latter also advocates maintaining the level of salaries and bonuses during the closures caused by the health crisis, but also for reviewing salary scales every semester to provide for a fairer inflation indexation.
In fact, the hospitality sector had recorded two successive revaluations in 2022 and 2023, a particular means of strengthening the attractiveness of talents. But with inflation rising, those at the bottom of the pay scale were even more likely to be affected by the minimum wage. Because, like almost half of the professional sectors in France, the hospitality sector had a scale below the minimum wage, from which 42% of the sector’s employees benefit.
The Big Buffets did not wait for these sectoral agreements to increase salaries. “I made a bet, through profit-sharing bonuses, to increase salaries by 30%,” says Louis Privat, who describes having to increase the price of his menus by 5 euros to do so, while informing its clients the possibility of canceling their reservation. respectively. The restaurant has also recently increased its prices again to support the 3.5-day week.
Source: BFM TV
