Lauren Hug | Side Dish with Schniper, Substack
“Everyone loves them,” says Choice Restaurant Concepts co-owner Crystal Byrd Thompson about children of team members. “Children are part of our world.”
We’re chatting about the challenges parents in the hospitality industry face regarding childcare. For starters, it’s expensive. The current annual cost of childcare for one child in Colorado is $20,000 (nearly $1,700 a month), according to Kids Strong Start, a local hub for information and action around childcare. That’s half what the average Colorado food prep and serving worker earns annually, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Even if child care were affordable, many restaurant employees work shifts on nights and weekends, times when most child care centers are closed.
“The restaurant industry’s so hard,” Crystal says. “Sometimes it’s hard to find daycare. It was for me too. I know how stressful it can be.”
So she tries to schedule parents for shifts whenever they have childcare. And when they don’t, her answer is clear: “Bring them,” she says. “If you have to, bring them.”
At her three co-located restaurants — bird tree café, T-Byrds Tacos and Tequila and District Elleven — everyone on the team willingly pitches in to care for staff kids.