b'grow. Many people have been working with us for How has your businessmore than 20 years, and their families have become dealt with supply chainpart of our families.HANSEN: As far as the staffing issues, I hired delays and shortages, andsomeone full-time just to recruit workers so that staffing issues? we are not subject to the whims of the market. We are investing a lot of money in recruitment for my various companies. Its a challenge, and one of the ways we are going to make this work is by enhancing the culture within our organization. Peter ARVIDSON: We have a great procurement teamDrucker said, Culture eats strategy for breakfast. that helps support our local teams and distributionIts not so much the money, its the culture. Were usage, so delays and shortages are minimized.working to make Bill Hansen not just a good place to Every market has its challenges, but we always thinkwork but a great place to work.outside the box and partner with local makers andCARNEY: We are just very open and transparent farmers to avoid some of the shipping issues. Thiswith clients about why we have price increases to also ensures the food feels like it belongs in thehelp deal with the labor market now demanding communities we are a part of. Research is key to ourhigher wages, along with setting slightly stricter success, and a lot of time, care and attention to detailquote minimums to help allow for off days for the go into our menu-planning. Our team is optimisticsmall labor team we now have post 2020. We are about what the future holds. focusing on the quality of the events and making As far as staffing, the hardest hit within oursure not to take on too much to make sure we division has been the culinary team. Some haveservice the events on the books with the best team taken different career paths or are moving on toand 100% focus on them!big-box companies. We are working directly with internship programs, culinary schools, and localGROSS: The Ohio Restaurant Association (ORA) universities and colleges to bring in new talent. Wecontinues to build relationships at every level of also consistently staff up and/or overstaff ourgovernment and to advocate on behalf of restaurant events to mitigate no-show challenges. and foodservice establishments. We are involved Our team also continues to innovate by addingin creating workforce solutions, such as building a new technology like self-ordering kiosks and thestudent pipeline, training and support for fair-chance ability for customers to order ahead. We are byemployees, and identifying sensible immigration no means replacing real people with technologyreforms. Industry success will also depend on because they are the backbone of who we are atthe continued support of consumers. The ORA is Lancer Hospitality. We have seen success incommitted to working with our members to keep the completing regular onboarding sessions, holdinggeneral public informed about how guests can best appreciation awards, and incentivizing those whosupport their local restaurants.take on more responsibility, which in turn makes for higher wages. We appreciate every member of our staff and give them the opportunities to succeed and 40 CATERING, FOODSERVICE & EVENTS cfe-news.com'