line cook

dishwasher

server

prep cook

office manager

Cactus Club Cafe

First of all, no matter how much serving experience you have, get ready to do months of hosting. Hosting shifts are only 2 hours long and your lucky if you get 4 shifts a week. 
Once you finally move up, you go through an extensive amount of product knowledge, testing and training. All of which you think would set you up for success as a server in their restaurant, right? 

Wrong. 

The product knowledge tests are outdated and provide you with answers to questions guest NEVER ask. 
Your trainer's will all train you differently, and maybe one trainer will know what is ACTUALLY expected of you as a server at cactus. But the others will tell you the wrong ways to do things.

Get ready to continue working 2 HOUR SHIFTS as a server. Lots of splits. But also plenty of cancellations to your shifts; sometimes 1 hour before you start. And they WILL try to send you home after 1 hour into your shift.
Also, after they "cut" you, you have 30 minutes to do a bunch of side duties. After 30 minutes is up, Management makes sure that you are not paid for anytime after your 30 minutes. Yet, they still expect you to run food, and help out in any way possible. Forget about doing your duties to get out of there when THEY are busy, because its YOUR DUTY to help even when you're not getting paid. 

All of your managers will treat you differently. And if you ask for ways to improve, they wont provide detailed feedback. My one manager was quick to pull me aside to tell me everything I was doing wrong. Then later I would ask another manager if their solution was correct, and I would then be informed it was wrong. 
All managers, shift leaders, servers, and hosts, all seem to have a different idea about EVERYTHING in the restaurant. There appears to be no set standards for everyone to follow. And all answers you're given by one, will be wrong to another.

I brought up communication issues with managers, as well as the GM. I explained my situations and all the conflicting answers and advice I was receiving. Management seemed to only blindly protect their fellow management team without hearing me out. 
I worked here for 6 months, all with the mentality that "things will get better". If I work harder, If I help out more, If I pick up more shifts, I will get better - It will get better. 

It didn't.

In my exit interview, I spoke openly with my manager. The one I gave my notice to encouraged me to talk with my GM. I gave my main points on how the restaurant seems to lack communication, I get told something different every day. I provided examples. I spoke respectfully, and hoped that my GM would level with me. Bare minimum, I expected to be heard out. And at the end of it, my GM blindly stood up for their management team with the attitude that they could do-no-wrong.
Instead, it ultimately was my fault for not trying hard enough. The GM encouraged me to practice more unprofessional behavior as a solution to my problem.

10/10 would not recommend this job to my worst enemy. 
I do not believe disrespect, misleading directions, and free labor is worth walking/driving whatever distance it may be, for a 2 hour shift. 

Also, tips are better in a cheep breakfast restaurant than here.

I started working to Cactus Club Cafe after working in a different restaurant, and I was super excited about working there because I have always enjoyed going to cactus, and it always seems like good vibes all around. I really wanted to work somewhere with flexibility with availability and time off, along with good management and healthy environment. I really value these things because it was all traits that my old employer lacked. I was glad to learn that cactus is all of these things! However, the other servers are not the most friendly or welcoming of new people; especially servers who are older and have been there for a while - AKA lounge servers. There is a bit of favourtism that occurs in the workplace; just like most workplaces to be fair. They claim that "attitude determines your altitude" as one of their 4 values. Meaning that your career advancements, and raises are dependent on the attitude you have and bring to the workplace. I personally think this is great, but it is not always followed. 
Also, I strongly value recognition and positive feedback. Some of the higher up managers are good at commenting on positive things during shifts and during check ins, but some others are only focusing on things that you need to work on - which is good but would be nice to see get some other feedback too. Some of the staff is very sweet and welcoming and friendly and like to chat. Most of the others are much colder, not so welcoming, and are fairly cliquey with each other. It honestly kinda feels like you are at a new school with all the "popular" girls, who are judgey and cliquey and like to gossip. Again, a common thing in workplaces with a lot of young girls, mainly restaurants! But cactus club is at the top of the tier for this. They definitely tend to hire more attractive looking people, not meaning you have to look like a model or really pretty or anything; but that you hold yourself well, groomed nicely, and dress professional. Which I think is a good thing in a restaurant. 
On the bright side, tips are good, machines start at 18% going to 22% and we tip out 7% to bar, kitchen , and support staff; so you rarely ever have to owe to the house out of your own pocket! And its usually a fun environment, but does get fairly busy and you have quite a few tables at a time. Can get busy and a bit stressful, but there is a decent amount of support offered by shift leaders, occassionally. If you like adrenaline rushes, and work well under stress this is a great job for you; or just don't work on weekend evenings Lol. But overall, it is pretty good! I just wish the culture was a little bit better and staff were more friendly with new people. 

The job itself is face-paced and requires a great deal of time-management and ability to keep up. Morning team consisted of a more senior group, so we didn't receive a lot of fresh, new-to-the-industry candidates as they would not be able to handle expected work load. Every season or so they introduce new menu items, and it seems every year they become more and more prep-heavy and time consuming, making it increasingly difficult to keep up with production demand. As demand grows, the need for more employees grows, but is never met. Constantly working OT because the support needed was not provided. Space for the growing employee demand is non-existent, with employees needing to cram up on prep tables unfit for multiple people and zero space to maneuver safely with heavy loads. This location needs a serious kitchen upgrade in order to function properly and safely. Part of your wage is paid in tips, so it fluctuates with the seasons - $23 an hour is actually $17 an hour and 6 tip shares. Breaks were very uncommon as you never felt you had time and it was an unwritten expectation that you stay half hour past your scheduled end time to make up for the break. Not worth it for the stress level. Benefits packages are not available for full-time line/prep cooks, only management. You have the ability to move up, but depending on the sous chef overseeing your training, and their opinion of you and your work quality, it will likely take years once you embark on that journey. Alternatively, if you're friends with the sous chef, you'll likely get promoted immediately. This process also includes taking on a mass amount of extra administrative style assignments, which could have you working 10-12 hour days. Work-life balance was decent, if you're not on the sous chef journey! If you have availability requirements, they do their best to accommodate if you're a valued employee.

I liked working with some of my peers during my time there but I wouldn't recommend just anyone to work at Cactus for a few main reasons. Firstly, its the pay and that's what matters most for a lot of people, while I was working there I would ask for a raise a few times because I was working on tasks that were beyond what I was being paid for, but they never increased my hourly and only my tip wage by only a single dollar.  Secondly, I could not stand the management there, I hope it's different in other Cactus branches but at the one I worked at, a lot of the managers and chefs were extremely lazy. Whenever the lunch or dinner rush would hit, the Chefs would always move to the expo side and call and ask us how long it would take to make the food and serve it even though we needed help on our stations. Another observation I saw while working there was also how during closing times and shutting the whole restaurant down, Everyone else would be working their hardest to get stuff done quickly while the Sous Chefs and Front of House Managers would sit in their office and chat with each other instead of helping us close. Thirdly, I really disliked the culture of the back of house. Normally in a kitchen, it's all about keeping each other up and getting through the lunch/dinner rush together but in Cactus, it was all about one-man armies. For them what they wanted was who could do the most amount of work all on their own and in their own respective spot on the kitchen line. Overall, I would highly recommend people that are interested in the kitchen industry to perhaps look somewhere else other than this Cactus location because of the very reason that they really do not care a lot about you as a person and look for people who are willing to tolerate people being thrown extra work for the same pay.

This job is very stressful. Often the new hires are not trained properly, and everything (repreps, environment, etc) falls on one or two people. And you only get minimum wage. Most raises that you earn (beg for) go on your tips and not your hourly. You don't get benefits until you become sous chef. There's no overtime pay (which means working for free because we're so unferstaffed). Cooks have been scheduled for up to 14 consecutive days. It's very difficult to get a food break (whether 15 or 30 minutes), again, because of understaffing. And if you do get a break, a lot of the time management will make you stay an extra 15-30 minutes past your 8 hours, depending on how long of a break you took. This company does not care about its employees. Work-life balance is incredibly difficult to achieve, especially when sous chefs are constantly phoning/texting you asking you to buy product, or changing your schedule with little to no notice. Management will often put all their effort into training one promising employee rather than training everyone equally to ensure a balanced team. The more stations and prep you know, the more they will exploit you. Raises are few and far between, and I've even been told I'm getting a raise, but it was just minimum wage increasing. The chefs will force this company's ideology down your throat and expect you to swallow and say thank you. I could go on for so much longer but I think I've said enough. I really can't recommend against working here enough. The only reason I still work here is the people. The kitchen team is full of great people who are fun to work with, and I can even say I've found a family in them, but the cons far outweigh the pros. 

Cactus Club was my first employer-- one thing I love about the company is how willing they are to give young people a foot in the door-- and I feel satisfied in the experience/knowledge I gained there.

The management was hit-or-miss. My General Manager was AMAZING, there were a couple other managers who were also great, and a few who were downright terrible. Personally I never clashed with any of my managers there no matter how capable they were or weren't, because I was capable in my position so I was mostly left alone (lol). I appreciate that Cactus likes to promote from within and give people experience.

Working FOH in a restaurant that appeals to obnoxious, entitled, nouveau-riche clientele is not a job for the thin-skinned or anxious. I hung on so long because my coworkers were (for the most part) awesome, fun, and funny, which made the clientele tolerable up to a point. But customers made me cry many, many times. If you can put up with that you can make seriously good money as a server.

Another big downside is the weird objectification of women that's encoded in company policy and dress code. I knew what I was getting myself into when I started working there, but I could see the focus on appearance in FOH staff being really toxic for some young people.

In conclusion: my time there was longer, more fulfilling, and more fun than I assumed it would be. The people working there were also way cooler than I assumed they would be, based on stereotypes about what kind of people work FOH at Cactus (again: lol). I learned a lot, I felt very valued by my superiors, and I'd consider it a positive experience overall, especially for anyone looking for a first job!

As a hostess you are treated like the bottom of the barrel, you are half doorman, half janitor and more of a robot than anything else. You are required to open the door for every person who walks in and if you miss it, you're in trouble. I once had an entire 8 hour shift just on the door opening and closing it, even better one of the doors was missing and it was October. Freezing and pointless because one side was already open, it was silly. 
You are not aloud to answer the phone or take to go orders, so you're pretty much stuck doing nothing a lot of the time. one time I took a take out order (incredibly easy and helpful for managers/staff when they're preoccupied like in this example) because the man on the phone was in a rush to order for his office and complained before about being late because we took so long to take his order.. the manager was fine with me taking it until she messed up the order and later told the general manager what I did and he wrote me up for it. - although it was all well and good when I helped her out because she was busy and I had was trying to make the customer happy.
You are meant to sweep and do bathroom checks every 15 minutes, set up all reservations, flip the day set up to evening set up, greet and seat, you are required to wear a blazer as a hostess even in the summer, and you are required to wear heels. Basically, one of the worst jobs I've ever had. Not because of what we had to do, but how little respect you get as a hostess considering how much you do. Maybe it was just the location, I've heard lots of good things about other locations but cactus Langley was full of gossiping, insensitive, ungrateful for lack of a better word jerks... for the most part.

Worked there for almost 2 years and a lot of people like/liked working at Cactus, but especially at the location I worked at no one actually enjoyed working there for valid reason. However for the most part, there's nothing wrong with the restaurant itself, most people were nice, wasn't a strict environment, and benefits of employee discount and tips. But the issue were the managers. Other than the fact that they were chill and easy going people, they sucked at their jobs. Expo line could be knee deep in allergies that need to be run out, the restaurant could have no tables for resos, but you'd still see all the managers leaning up against the wall on theirs phones chatting it up with the servers. Yes, there were few moments where they assisted around the restaurant, but overall, they were basically getting free money just to hangout. Moreover, they continuously over hired, meaning some people were lucky to get more than just an on call shift that week. Unless you were their favourite, where on average they'd get about 4-5 shifts per/week. But when you bring up the issue to a manager, you first had to make sure to CC the general manager or they won't feel obligated to respond to your email and do their jobs. Then when you finally get the chance to express your concerns, they seem genuine with how you're feeling and start scheduling you, but then after about two weeks you're back to having nothing. I've had about three or four conversations with managers and in return they gave nothing except for false hope. Management honestly felt like being in a situationship with a man who says he has feelings for you, but isn't quite ready to put a label on it yet. Fake, manipulative, and just enough to give you hope. 

Typical day at work can be either easygoing or stressful depending on how the restaurant is flowing and how well you maintain communication with coworkers. I have learned that working as a vocal team can be a key factor in trying to control the morale and pace in this type of work. 
It is important you get proper training from the start because you will quickly learn that an “easygoing” day in this industry can still have lots of stressful moments if you are not properly trained on how to manage or prevent them without help.
Management has the potential to make an excellent environment but needs improvement with lack of communication between staff and schedule timing. (Possibly due to shortage of staff.) Workplace culture seems great but would be more ideal if more staff or management followed the company guidelines the way they were explained in orientations. 
The hardest part about this job is having to work alone at what sometimes feels a lot like a 2 person job if you do not have proper training so trying to stay ahead and keeping every one of your coworkers happy can be difficult if you do not communicate which is not always easy to do in this busy business because everyone is in a rush which makes it hard to take breaks because you are worried about letting people down or falling too far behind.  
The most enjoyable part of the job is joking around with people the moments you can because you are all constantly busy.

Cactus can be a circus: you walk into your shift fully ready to feed over 1000 mouths on a busy weekend day. This restaurant demands high food quality standards, and for that, I do respect it. This line will force you to execute well, at a pace nearing 2.1 entrees per minute during the 5 hour rush on busy nights. That is a lesson worth learning. Beyond that - though - you won't learn much cookery. To be frank, a good understanding of cookery is almost discouraged, because this is a corporate kitchen, and things must adhere to specs at all time with no room for a chef's intuition. 

Management is responsive, understanding and very flexible with scheduling; there are ample opportunities to move up from your current role into more advanced roles, and new leadership is always picked internally as a priority.

However, as this is a corporate restaurant, you'll spend as much of your time navigating politics as you do the fire you cook on if you wish you move up in the ranks. 

This kitchen is not neurodivergent friendly. Optics really matter - you can become seriously limited in your progression simply due first appearances, and soft skills will get you further than cooking skills. 

Cactus only hires staff with good vibes. You will be surrounded by individuals with a good outlook on life, cooking, and career. It's easy to thrive in that environment.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Line cook 7 salaries reported	$20.72 per hour
Dishwasher 17 salaries reported	$18.28 per hour
Server 23 salaries reported	$16.84 per hour
Prep cook 16 salaries reported	$19.42 per hour
Office manager 5 salaries reported	$21.30 per hour

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