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This Issue 02/26/2004

Also in this issue

• Guides
• Ross Clark: Alligator Shirts
• Let's Get Free

At "the Plough & the Stars," a popular Irish-themed bar and restaurant tucked into an out-of-the-way corner of Old City, the staff is well-acquainted with the Penn crowd. Though it is a relatively low-key establishment, few of its employees fail to tell of the Penn fraternities that occasionally make en masse ventures to 2nd and Chestnut streets. From the kid who was carted out in an ambulance after drinking too much at a fraternity shindig to the party of 500 expected that very night (the mind boggles at the prospect of fitting 500 people into the large but hardly sprawling eatery), Penn is a fact of life for those who work here.

But thankfully, they don't have to worry about most of that until after sundown. A weekday lunch is a much more relaxed affair, and since each waiter must work a lunch in order to be able to work a presumably more lucrative dinner -- where each server's tips have the potential to double -- everyone gets his or her fair share of rushes and lulls.

At 1 p.m. on a Thursday, four servers -- two young women decked out in the requisite all black and two men wearing black pants and a blue dress shirt -- cover the entire area of the restaurant's two floors. Sparsely populated with diners, mostly in small groups or even alone, the scene hardly hints at the chaos soon to come. Those working the upstairs mezzanine have no problem delivering orders for those stuck on the often-busier bottom floor. Nonetheless, the latter rarely has an idle moment. And the former, when there is no food to run, water to refill or breadbaskets to carry, bides its time folding linen napkins for dinner, clearing tables -- no busboys during lunch! -- or straightening up the place settings.

Amidst the deliberate and constant movement, the Plough is not an easy place for a reporter to land an interview. There's no downtime for a lengthy conversation, although the servers still manage to joke with each other -- a poke here, a murmured comment there. Still, there's always something to do.

All of the diligence pays off -- literally. The Plough employs a unique system of tip-sharing. Where the typical restaurant allows each server to keep most of what he or she earns, minus a small portion for the busboys, food runners and bartenders, here at the Plough, each night's haul is pooled and then divided equally among that night's wait staff, with the busboys taking from 10 to 15 percent depending on how many are working that night. This arrangement encourages the waiters to help out when someone is in a jam rather than creating an every man for himself mentality.

As for cheaters? According to the Plough management, there aren't many. Although someone could conceivably report only part of his earnings, the good faith system generally works. If suspicion arises, it's possible to check the waiter's sales for the night and look at how much he turned in relative to that number.