Browns Crafthouse closure in Vancouver leads to angry ex-employees
A Browns Crafthouse in Vancouver has left its employees high and dry after it announced its closure, and one employee is speaking out.
“It’s frustrating when you have to fight for the bare minimum of your rights,” Sergei Campos, a bartender and supervisor at the eatery, told Daily Hive.
Five weeks after Browns Crafthouse Seymour got notice that hourly employees joined United Food & Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 247, Campos said staff were blindsided by news that the restaurant would be shutting down.
Over two dozen employees were handed their two weeks’ notice the same day Browns Crafthouse had organized a day to sit with the union to bargain.
“The reality is that negotiations never happened,” Campos said.
Did unionization lead to restaurant closure?
UFCW Local 247’s director of bargaining, Dean Patriquin, said a spokesperson for Browns Crafthouse told him the shutdown had nothing to do with the unionization.
However, Patriquin pointed out that when staff were given their notice, other locations within the Browns Restaurant Group still had advertisements on job sites for vacant positions.
“None of those people were offered jobs at the other locations,” he said. “They can say that it had nothing to do with it, but… I find it hard to believe that all 25 would not be very good employees.”
Screenshot of a post shared on Reddit.
Browns Restaurant Group Executive Vice President Bruce Fox said in an emailed statement that the closure of Browns Crafthouse near W Pender Street and Seymour Street was due to financial challenges.
“Unfortunately, this location has been struggling since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since that time it has been losing money, and we have no reason to believe the situation will improve anytime soon,” he said. “While it does not make the decision to close any easier for us or our employees, this restaurant is not alone in this respect. It is a difficult time for the industry with many restaurants forced to close due to diminished customer bases, mounting losses, and growing debt.”
Fox added the company recognizes that “this news is difficult for our staff and loyal customers,” but said, “This is not a decision that we made lightly.”
Campos admitted the Browns location had an “inconsistency of sales.”
“Whenever there were these big events happening, we would get slammed, we’d have lineups out the door,” he said. “But the restaurant did also suffer… on days we weren’t busy, we lost money.”
“Overworked” staff feeling “forgotten”
According to Campos, in late August 2023, the Browns Crafthouse general manager was let go and not replaced for four months. This left staff to take on extra duties and responsibilities without an increase in their pay, he said.
The Browns Crafthouse has a dining room that seats nearly 100 people, but Campos said the restaurant did not have support staff.
“There’s no one at the door to greet you, we do that. There’s no one who cleans our tables, there’s no one who runs our food, there isn’t even anyone who does our dishes. The dishwashing actually got split between the front of house and back of the house staff. So the only positions we had in the restaurant were servers, bartenders, and line cooks.”
To make matters worse, the way tips were distributed changed and staff were not happy about it.
Previously, customers would be charged on their bill, which would go towards the kitchen staff. However, in the fall the company took the charge off the bill and servers were asked to make up the difference out of their own tips.
Servers who had previously tipped out just 3.5% of their sales were now expected to tip out about 5%, according to Campos.
“That one and a half percent may not sound like a lot, but over time, it definitely adds up,” he said. “So if a server sold $1,000 on the shift right before they were tipping out, $35, now they’re tipping out $50.”
After putting up with the changes for two months: “Staff got tired of being overworked and I think everyone in that building just felt forgotten. They felt like they had no voice after our general manager was let go and tip out was raised. We were basically just told to suck it up,” he said.
So an application was put forth in November, and hourly employees joined UFCW Local 247.
After Browns Crafthouse received the letter informing that a union had been formed, Campos claimed the Vice President of Operations told employees in a meeting with the company’s head office and hourly staff that the restaurant would continue as normal and that it was business as usual.
However, staff were informed in the new year that the restaurant would be closing on January 31.
“All we want to do is work”
In the two weeks staff were preparing for the shutdown, Campos said the treatment of staff continued to be frustrating.
A day after informing staff of the shutdown, Campos said a notice was posted on the restaurant doors informing customers that the Browns Crafthouse would be closing three hours earlier, subsequently cutting hours for staff members who worked the evening shift.
Submitted by Sergei Campos
The Browns Crafthouse posted the note two days in a row until the union informed the company the staff were owed their last week’s average pay.
“Their severance is based on their eight weeks average pay. I think that might have been news to the company,” Patriquin said.
“If they didn’t want to pay a severance pay, that’s okay, that’s their decision. But then they have to let us work,” Campos added. “All we want to do is work. So it’s frustrating on top of them shutting it down, on top of not giving references, on top of giving us just two weeks notice — then they begin to cut hours.”
“If they had allowed us to simply show up to work and work for two weeks, there would be a lot less animosity,” he said.
Browns suggest reopening
In talks with Browns Crafthouse, Patriquin said he believes the company had wanted to reopen under a different banner.
“They had an offer to give people extra severance if the union’s willing to waive any rights that we have in that location [under successorship],” he said. “So since we’re unwilling to waive that, they’ve rescinded the offer of an extra week severance.”
Browns Restaurant Group franchises include Browns Crafthouse, Browns Socialhouse, and Liberty Kitchen. According to the group’s site, there are over 80 total locations in Canada and the US.
Searching for work in the slowest time of year
Campos has been working in the industry for about 15 years and has gained a lot of experience. While he is not concerned if he will find work, he said, he is worried for his co-workers.
“People who are international students, people who’ve been in Canada for less than a year, young people who are in their early 20s,” he listed. “We had one guy who had left his job to join us about two months before this all happened. So he doesn’t even qualify for severance.”
As a supervisor, Campos said he’s doing what he can to help his co-workers by spending his weekends writing references. He noted, however, that finding a job may not be easy right now as Browns Crafthouse laid off staff in the middle of January, “which is the slowest time of the year.”
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