Posted on 04/01/2017 4:27:35 PM PDT by Trump20162020
This seems to be a perennial argument in the food service industry but it never fails to attract my interest. The Washington Post picked up the story of an an upscale Italian restaurant in North Carolina called Caruso’s. They had run into a number of issues with parents bringing young and too often horribly behaved children into the eatery for dinner who then wound up annoying the rest of the clientele. As they tell the story, the straw which broke the camel’s back was a young girl with an i-Pad who was playing videos at full volume despite being asked to turn it down (or off) and the parents were completely failing to discipline her or resolve the situation. Shortly after that they imposed a ban on bringing children under the age of five into the establishment.
The typical howls of outrage from some parents began immediately, but there was another reaction as well.
The ban — conceived by the restaurant’s owner, Pasquale Caruso — has led to a dramatic increase in reservations, said Nunez, who said Caruso’s has seen a spike in diners, from about 50 per day to around 80.
“Banning children has always been a topic in the industry and every owner says, ‘I wish I could do it,’” he said. “Our owner has the full support of the staff. We work here to make a living, too, and we support our owner 100 percent.”
Good for them. Too often you see only one side of this debate in the press and it centers on the parents who are complaining and saying that families are being stigmatized or punished or what have you.
(Excerpt) Read more at hotair.com ...
I’ll hoist a beer to that man’s memory. Hoo Raaah.
(It’s clear you parented a good son.)
We do not allow children at Bushwood, sir! Lol!!!
Nope. I’d drop that POS right in the holy water and bless it goodbye.
I don’t find drunks or people with smelly cologne fun. Can we keep them out of restaurants?
Fast food eateries, pizza & pasta houses are not experiences they are conveniences. When I take my children out to dinner it is to experience something different, to learn something about a culture and its foods and to broaden their horizons.
I don’t really understand why it would be appropriate to take a badly behaved child to dinner at your list of acceptable spots either there are still other diners who deserve to be able to eat in peace or are only those able to afford an expensive meal deserving of courtesy?
If I lived nearby, I would eat there. This Italian restaurant is actually owned by an Italian. Out here, some Italian restaurants are owned by Middle Easterners.
When our kids were young, the church we attended had a very strong Wednesday night program and for many years, had a family night dinner, cooked at the church kitchen by volunteers, for a very reasonable price.
We’d go eat dinner, the kids would play with their friends for a little while, and then they’d go to their programs.
The kids learned to eat out in public in a very safe setting, where if it didn’t go really smoothly, we could take care of it and nobody was offended.
They also LOVED to eat out at restaurants and knew that they had to be on their BEST behavior or we wouldn’t take them out again. And they knew we meant it.
We actually got compliments on them on occasion.
However, we never took them to upscale restaurants.
We couldn’t afford that much money and they wouldn’t really appreciate it.
>>This is not true at all. It has nothing to do with age. There are plenty of 10 year old noisy brats, and plenty of loud obnoxious adults.<<
It has EVERYTHING to do with age COUPLED with bad parents — since Baby Booners started coddling their kids.
Every great now and then you will have adults act boorishly at a restaurant and they are quickly removed.
It isn’t the restaurant’s nor my job to mind children. Parents have proven they can’t and won’t.
There is no point in your complex policy when a no-kids policy works just fine. It isn’t like kids are being excluded from something they really desire.
High-priced dining is an adult undertaking.
Number One: It's not the child's fault he has crappy parents. Number Two: You all that judge have no idea where I might becoming from. Everyone thinks their child, grand child is the best. cutest, smartest, most special and unique person ever to grace the planet. EVERYONE thinks this, so kind of proves it's not true! Number Three: I have no problem with a parent trying to teach their children how to behave in a nice restaurant. But how about not doing it during prime adult time? Do lunch!
BTW: I do notice a well behaved child and when I can compliment the parents. Planes? Kids cry on planes! Church? Kids get bored in church. I deal with that. Even offer the parent a sympathetic look. but when I go out to a nice restaurant I want to enjoy my meal and the ambiance! Sue me!
We used to frequent some Italian/pizza places in northern NJ. On slow nights, there was always one of their kids doing homework at one of the tables. They always seemed to love my kids. One owner got upset when I told him I was moving to VA from NJ. "You can't go"! Nothing up-scale, to be sure. But we never robbed the place.
>>And here come the child haters.<<
Nope — generational bad-parent haters. Kids are just kids. It is entire swaths of parents who have created this problem.
Didn’t say it was acceptable, just predictable. Everyone thinks their kids are exceptional! Everyone, so if everyone is exceptional, then no one is. Get it! Both my sisters in law just think their grandkids are the bomb! Their grandkids are freaking obnoxious! I have a right to have an adult conversation. So I just don’t go. I don’t care where they go. I won’t be there.
Yes.
I guess you are entitled to your opinion. I believe it is the bigotry of low expectations at work.
My kids certainly did enjoy and have favorite dishes at what I consider upscale places. My daughter’s favorite restaurant at age 4 was The Ballerina in London, my son’s the Gay Hussar. They all loved Russian food. I don’t enjoy pretentious places with weird ingredients which excludes most French places but I had no hesitation with posh places and we never impacted negatively on the other diners around us.
We traveled as a family to NYC at least monthly, to Europe, UK, Australia & New Zealand. I felt no need to have an adults night out so if the kids were excluded we didn’t go.
That gives you an unending stream of judgment calls which will certainly be second-guessed. “You let a white kid act up last week. You’re only kicking us out because we’re black/Latino/gay.”
Hey I freely admit I am a bad pet parent! Does everyone want me to bring my adorable but highly unruly black lab/border collie to any restaurant? She will try to steal your food! I think not! So.....
I have a lot of grandkids. There is nothing wrong with a place that wants to cater to adults. There are plenty of places appropriate for kids.
Some of the finer dining places might want kids’ hours earlier in thd day to train up their next generation of customers.
I think you should suit yourself and go where you are comfortable. Life is short so you should do what makes you happy.
We had no trouble finding places where we were welcome, and we succeeded in raising children who are comfortable in a wide variety of environments and who respect other people’s rights in public places. That was what we wanted to achieve and we did.
I respond to people who lump any group and say for example all children can’t behave in restaurants, all women are catty, all Jews are money grubbing, etc etc etc.
>>I guess you are entitled to your opinion. I believe it is the bigotry of low expectations at work.<<
It is the observations of low behavior. Your kids may be the exception but the reality is that well-behaved kids at adult venues are rare. Actually, well-parented kids are the rarity. As a frequent traveler, I thank you on behalf of your fellow travelers and diners for your well-behaved kids.
But there is no way to screen for that so the only fair thing is to have adult-only zones. Just as there are family resorts and adult-only resorts in other countries and SHOULD be here.
Really? Even if they are well-behaved?
I can guarantee you that if you had been at a restaurant with my young son, you probably would not have known he was there. He learned very early not to act up in public. I don't know how I taught him that--husband claimed that I would slap his hands if he misbehaved--whatever, he did not dare misbehave in public.
Parents who allow their children to misbehave loudly in public annoy me to death.
I think perhaps you don’t notice the well behaved ones. They just blend in. My kids were especially intolerant of kids that weren’t being well parented at restaurants. It really got on their nerves.
In life we have room for all kinds of restaurants and I’m sure you can find ones where kids are discouraged as I was able to find ones where they were welcome. When we went to Atlantis for example a couple places were adults only, we just didn’t go there. I usually find if kids aren’t welcome I don’t like the ambiance anyway.
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