Great Money, Bad Management, Little work/life balance - Bartender Delaware North Employee Review

4.0
19 May 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

If you get the chance to work here and get into a good bar its really good money. High volume, premium prices, good tips, good co-workers. Full-timers receive benefits like Health Care, Vision, Dental, and 401k contributions. Pretty good, never paid more than $100 for a visit anywhere, whether it be the doctor's or the dentist. Good supervisors. If you don't like having a life outside of your job and all you want to do is make money, grind, and plan on staying at the job long-term (& I mean really long-term) it does pay off after a few years of being there. Some bartenders have been there for 20+years because it's very livable, good, stable money with benefits, (1st pick at schedules, time off, etc) at the top.

Cons

It's seniority based and you start at the bottom. So that means your chances of making better money than at any other regular restaurant will take 2-3 years to get to. Unless about 3-4 people happen to quit right before you start and you get lucky to be higher up on the seniority list. Not all bars are the same. Some make more money than others. The bar that makes the least amount of money is where you'll probably start. Mid-Management (not supervisors) is not good about giving time off. Only those who have had seniority for about 10+years (those at the top) are the ones who ever actually get their requests approved.. Anyone who is new has to either get their shift covered or call out. It's rare to get time off approved, even though you do accrue PTO, as a new hire. They have a huge call out problem. So if you're at the bottom of the seniority list, they'll force you to stay and close or cover someone else's shifts. Which can be good and bad. If you were scheduled to be out early and then you're forced to close, you can be out as late as midnight when you could have come in at 6am that day. So could be like 16hr shifts. Upside to this is that you could get moved to a bar that makes great money and then its worth your time. It really just depends and is a toss up each day.

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Delaware North Response
1y
Thank you for your review. At the heart of our company, it's always been about people. We prioritize the well-being of our team members and strive to create an environment where people can thrive. We will share your feedback with leadership. We hope you continue to love where you work.

Explore other reviews about Delaware North

5.0
9 May 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

good environment, nice people, nice food

Cons

poor network, terrible traffic ,low salary

2.0
19 May 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good first exposure to client facing roles if no prior exposure. Good for learning to balance technical execution with advisory duties. Good for hands-on experience/learning CRM tools you may not have had prior experience with. Decent benefits. Opportunities to create your own “fun” side projects if you have enough drive to do so.

Cons

Long hours, frequent after-hours/on-call work, including weekends and holidays. Lack of clearly defined process/constantly changing process, making onboarding new hires challenging or educating other departments more difficult. Frequently pivoting business decisions, causing further hiccups in process. Lack of communication. Lack of upward career mobility. Base pay is relatively low. While there are opportunities for raises, chances of promotion are very rare. High stress, high turnover environment that causes scrambling to fill in gaps of lost productivity, causing more pivoting business decisions and revisions of process.

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Delaware North Response
2w
Thank you for taking the time to share your feedback. We value hearing from former team members and recognize there are always opportunities to improve the employee experience. If you would like to share additional details, we encourage you to contact askhr@delawarenorth.com so your concerns can be reviewed further.
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