# How many contractors provide breakfast for employees



## daffysplumbing (Oct 16, 2017)

Maybe, just bragging!

My employees look forward to coming to work every morning because we give them coffee, hot chocolate, waffles, toast and bagels. During the winter we add chicken with rice soup and sometimes we provide donuts. For some reason, most of my employees don't eat donuts.

I feel that providing the food makes employees more productive because many employees get out of bed too late and skip breakfast. The food makes for a lot of good comradery between employees.

We also take an entire crew (about 4 employees) to lunch when one employee in the group has a birthday.

The cost for the food is insignificant when compared to gross income. We purchase enough bread and bagels for a month and store them in a freezer. Waffle mix is about $7 for 10 pounds and coffee must cost less than $1 for 2 to 3 pots. It takes less than 15 minutes to prepare everything in the morning and less than 10 minutes to clean everything.

I think it makes a nice atmosphere when my employees are enjoying their breakfast and we are discussing business for the day.


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## griz (Nov 26, 2009)

The gentleman that took me in to his family and taught me a great deal about this trade provided breakfast at his home every morning. All you had to do was show up at 6:30.

Lunch was also provided.

I did not provide daily breakfast to my guys but quite often at the job i did breakfast for them. Lunch pretty regular also.

Great moral builder.


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## greg24k (May 19, 2007)

I always buy coffee with a butter roll to all my subcontractors when they work on my jobs, also get the water on the hot days. Certain subs "the owners" we go out for lunch from time to time when they around and usually we will fight for the check who is gonna pay for it.

Most guys have coffee before they get to the job so when I ask them if they want anything they say no.

On the general note getting guys butter roll and coffee, it's a thing of the past, it's been sort of a tradition of doing that since I remember, especially when I was younger just starting out and doing work for guys with old-school values, you were pretty much forced to have a roll and coffee and stop doing everything when 10am hits. 
Some guys I remember even had an open tab on the food trucks... I doubt you will see much of that today, things changed big time since then.


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## Inner10 (Mar 12, 2009)

greg24k said:


> I always buy coffee with a butter roll to all my subcontractors when they work on my jobs, also get the water on the hot days. Certain subs "the owners" we go out for lunch from time to time when they around and usually we will fight for the check who is gonna pay for it.
> 
> Most guys have coffee before they get to the job so when I ask them if they want anything they say no.
> 
> ...


When I was a teenager I worked at a chip wagon and they would run a tab for local workers. I remember the owner cutting people off when their debt surpassed a massive amount like 30 dollars lol.

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## greg24k (May 19, 2007)

Inner10 said:


> When I was a teenager I worked at a chip wagon and they would run a tab for local workers. I remember the owner cutting people off when their debt surpassed a massive amount like 30 dollars lol.
> 
> Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk


When I was in my teen days we use to run tabs in locals stores like pizza joints, groceries, dinners, clothing stores etc.

Remember bringing a date on the day when you broke to a local pizza joint and you figure you order a nice spread to impress the girl and everything goes nicely until the pizza owner sees you ducking in the back boot and he comes over n says you not getting nothing until you pay for the 8 pies that you owe.:laughing: 
So you go to another joint and the min you step over the threshold they tell you to get out until your crew will make it good on your tab... Now you have to BS your way in to save face and it worked 98% of the time most owners will cut you some slack... 
I don't know if they did it because of you a neighborhood kid, or if they don't cut you a break we will rip-off the delivery driver of all his food.

The way we use to do this, you have 4-5 guys hanging out and everyone got the munchies, between 4-5 guys we lucky if you could scrape enough for a pie which still not be enough to feed everyone, so we would take the food from the delivery car.
Let's say you at the house #50 and the pizza joint is at the building #24 so we would order food to a house # 65. They would put 2 orders together, and we would be the 1st stop, so when the delivery guy brings 1 pie to you, we offer him to smoke a joint, or start getting money for a pizza pie, a few guys run out the back door and take the food out of the car which supposes to go to the next address.

Some local wise guys owned this pizza joints or they had involvement in one or another they knew whats going on but they closed their eye on neighborhood kids, not to mention most kids I grew up with fathers were connected in one way or another so this was a common thing in the neighborhood. Sometimes they would tell you that if you do this again they would give you a beating, so you stop for a while and a few weeks later you hit someone else. LOL, It was part of the neighborhood life. 
Talking about going back to the memory lane.:thumbsup:


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## Fishindude (Aug 15, 2017)

We used to do a big breakfast at the shop quarterly for meeting safety milestones. Every month that we hit certain safety goals we took them all out to lunch. Also had large safety luncheons on jobsites for the entire crew, subs and clients employees periodically.

A little free food goes a long way towards good morale.


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## ChickWithADrill (Feb 20, 2018)

My boss has always bought me lunch. As is the case with many luggers, which is where I started so many years ago, I was living paycheck to paycheck. Honestly, some days that was the only meal I got. I could have some big box builder come to me and offer to double my pay with full benefits and I'd still say no, I'm happy where I am, thanks.


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## Windycity (Oct 3, 2015)

We send someone out every day at 915ish and goto McDonald’s or Dunkin’ Donuts and get whatever meal they want 


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## Stryker1-1 (Dec 25, 2017)

When I worked in corporate we used to keep the lunchroom filled with stuff everyone would chip in to buy stuff so you could always make breakfast and take it to your desk.

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## Big Johnson (Jun 2, 2017)

daffysplumbing said:


> . Waffle mix is about $7 for 10 pounds ..[/Quote
> 
> 
> Where?


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## Inner10 (Mar 12, 2009)

Big Johnson said:


> daffysplumbing said:
> 
> 
> > . Waffle mix is about $7 for 10 pounds ..[/Quote
> ...


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## Big Johnson (Jun 2, 2017)

Inner10 said:


> Big Johnson said:
> 
> 
> > Walmart?
> ...


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## VinylHanger (Jul 14, 2011)

I bought my dog chicken nuggets on the way to work this morning. Does that count?

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## Inner10 (Mar 12, 2009)

Big Johnson said:


> Inner10 said:
> 
> 
> > I googled but couldn’t find anything. All I found was pancake powder.
> ...


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## Jay hole (Nov 12, 2013)

About the only thing my guys get from me for breakfast is unrealistic goals. I will say something like.... wrap this up and go home early, call it 10! It’s usually about 60 hours worth of work.


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## sunkist (Apr 27, 2012)

No breakfast, guys call in at start time no text (no text if sick you got to call and tell the lies) I try to take care of E mails, material stops in the AM and phone calls.

Friday payday there is a watering hole right by the bank where some of the help cash their checks.

So the deal is I will cover (pay the tab) for a couple of adult style beverages, I know its not PC any more to buy the guys a drink but you have to be a adult to drink, and only 18 to kill some one in a far of country makes sense to me:blink:


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## cedarboarder (Mar 30, 2015)

I hardly have time to cook breakfast for my self haha. Are they paid during this free breakfast? Got um running on carbs n sugar. Crack some eggs, a carton is 2 bucks. 

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## B.D.R. (May 22, 2007)

I used to buy coffee and treats of some kind. 
Then it seemed to be expected. 
Not reciprocal or appreciated. 
Buy your own fing coffee. 


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## cedarboarder (Mar 30, 2015)

VinylHanger said:


> I bought my dog chicken nuggets on the way to work this morning. Does that count?
> 
> Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk


My dog usually gets the last bite of the hash brown or I rip off the bacon that's sticking out of the sandwich.


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## daffysplumbing (Oct 16, 2017)

Big Johnson said:


> daffysplumbing said:
> 
> 
> > . Waffle mix is about $7 for 10 pounds ..[/Quote
> ...


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## JFElec (Nov 13, 2016)

Damn, now I’m gonna have to have waffles for lunch...


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## cedarboarder (Mar 30, 2015)

JFElec said:


> Damn, now I’m gonna have to have waffles for lunch...
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


One of my favorite joints with some great chicken waffles closed last year :sad:


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## woody123 (Apr 29, 2018)

i never do that, 
but i think that's awesome . i buy the occasional lunch or coffee , but not consistently

but i do believe you have to appreciate your workers.
they are there every day , making you money 
the clients come and go , but the employee is always there
i hate brow-beating bosses .
make them happy to be at work ,and they`ll make more money for you


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## MattK (Apr 2, 2009)

greg24k said:


> I always buy coffee with a butter roll to all my subcontractors when they work on my jobs, also get the water on the hot days. Certain subs "the owners" we go out for lunch from time to time when they around and usually we will fight for the check who is gonna pay for it.
> 
> Most guys have coffee before they get to the job so when I ask them if they want anything they say no.
> 
> ...


I remember being 18 working on large projects making green wages. We worked 7-5, no lunch breaks, but the maggot wagon came at 1030 and you took 20 for a quick bite. I also remember barely being able to afford to eat, so the truck owner would put me and others on the roll for the week and the following Monday we would square up and the cycle continued. Some pretty good food in the hot trays too.


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