Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal – by Mary Duan
Paolo’s Reza Samavarchian wants to talk. Really, he does.
But he’s got a large party awaiting his recommendations on after-dinner cognacs and brandies. He’s also got a party of nine, a party of five, two deuces and a single — all waiting to be recipients of the high-beam charm and consummate professionalism that has made Mr. Samavarchian one of the most wanted waiters in San Jose.
Twenty minutes later, a call. The Fairmont Hotel has sent over a party of four women. Go to Paolo’s and see Reza, they were told. He will take care of you.
And take care of you he does.
That’s why, despite the fact that it’s late on a Monday night — a night in the restaurant trade traditionally so slow that many places are closed that day — Reza Samavarchian is hopping. Looking at Tuesday night’s bookings, it’s not going to get any better as the week progresses.
“I wish you could see this book. It’s `Reza, Reza, Reza,’ everywhere,” Mr. Samavarchian says. “I love it so much. I love to see people smiling. I love to pamper them.”
And who doesn’t love to be pampered? For some, it’s getting a manicure. For others, it’s sitting in the section of a 21-year veteran waiter so trusted that many of his clients don’t even ask for a menu. Rather, they walk in and ask Mr. Samavarchian to select their food that evening.
A few streets down, at the Grill on the Alley in San Jose, veteran server Helmut Hassy acknowledges that he makes more money than the younger waiters. With 31 years of experience, the former certified public accountant has been waiting tables longer than some of his co-workers have been alive.
“There is no, `You work here for 20 years and you get the best tables,’” the Austrian-born Mr. Hassy says. “It used to be … that if you were here a long time you got good stations and the new people coming in got the worst. Now, we rotate each station.
“I do make more money than younger waiters, but I talk to people. I spend time on them,” he says. “The guests probably think, `Poor guy, he’s still hustling,’ but I think it’s because the young people are maybe not as charming.”
Back in the day, waiters were courtly. They set things on fire tableside, flambéing a little bananas Foster or some crepes Suzette for the amusement of guests. They whipped raw eggs into olive oil, lemon juice and garlic, poured it over hearts of romaine lettuce as diners watched, and presented them with a fresh Caesar salad.
Now, insurance agencies don’t like restaurants setting things on fire. The state health department frowns on salad dressings whipped up with raw eggs. If you want courtly, you almost have to leave the country — they still have courtly all over Europe — or you have to seek out the waiters who have longevity.
Longevity gets the tables.
Nobody will go on the record and refer to them as the “best tables” — that would imply that hierarchy exists for customers as well as for servers. But it only makes sense that a server who is able to develop a rapport with clients, over the long term, will make more money than the college kid who waits tables nights and weekends in order to pay for his education.
One restaurateur, who refused to be identified by name for fear that colleagues would smack him around with wet bar towels, says hierarchy among waiters and waitresses still exists.
“There are good stations, and there are some stations that aren’t as profitable,” he says. “We rotate them between the staff, (but) some restaurants work on a very strict seniority status. You have some waiters easily making more than the managers, and some are making close to six figures.”
In sales, it’s about relationships. At a restaurant, the waiter is a salesperson. Servers like Mr. Samavarchian and Mr. Hassy happen to be extremely good salesmen.
“If you get a couple that comes into your restaurant once a week like clockwork for 20 years, and they want John as their waiter every time, they’re going to get John as their waiter every time, because John has been there as long as they have,” says Armand Tiano, co-owner of 71 Saint Peter and Stratta, both in San Jose.
“You get these old-time waiters who have been there 15 years, 20 years, and then some new server comes in. Will he get the same stations and same treatment as a senior server? No.
“It’s the amount of time and the relationships with the customers that gets them the better tables.”
And it’s the server who has a grasp of the restaurant’s image and mission that gets the customers and, consequently, the bigger tips.
“Generally there are waiters who can make more money, but it doesn’t have to be because they’ve been there [at the restaurant] longer,” says Pat Burke, who’s waited on customers at the Grill on the Alley for two years.
Although new at the Grill, Mr. Burke, 34, has been working in the restaurant business since he was 16, flipping burgers at his father’s restaurant.
Those longtime servers who are regarded as successful tend to be very detail-oriented, adds Jalil Samavarchian Paolo’s maitre’ d, Reza’s brother, and husband of restaurant owner Caroline Allen.
“There’s a saying that a good server can make a bad meal taste great,” Jalil Samavarchian says. “A server with personality and charm can make a very grumpy and unhappy person very pleased.”
There isn’t a lot of that type left, Grill on the Alley manager Phillipe Azoulay says. At the Grill, waiters are graded by degree of performance, rather than how long they’ve been working. But longtime servers bring a lot of the experience you can’t teach anyone on paper, and they have seen a lot of things a new server can’t see yet.
“They are proactive and they know how to read people,” Mr. Azoulay says.
“They don’t make mistakes that cost you a lot of money. They don’t drop a glass of wine, they don’t lose balance on a loaded tray,” he adds.
“If you have six guys like that out on the floor during a busy dinner service, it’s a manager’s dream.”
MARY DUAN is a freelance writer based in Salinas.
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May 10th, 2002 | 
