Can you realistically work two serving jobs part-time?
I’m a 30-something former admin professional who transitioned into serving part-time while raising my kids. Prior to serving I had food/customer service experience as a barista, but Olive Garden is my first serving job.
I’ve been at OG for about 6 months and have done well there. I work at a very busy location and honestly probably make about as much money there as one realistically can.
That said, I’m starting to feel the “unlimited soup/salad/breadsticks for not enough money” burnout. I genuinely like serving, I think I’m pretty good at it for only having 6 months experience, and I feel like I could make better money in a local tavern/upscale casual environment.
My hesitation is that I actually like my coworkers and management (to an extent, there are some red flags with the GM) at OG. They’ve been respectful of my family commitments and never overschedule me.
So I’m trying to decide what makes the most sense career-wise and relationship-wise.
Would it be realistic to:
cut down to ~10 hours/week at OG (Sunday + Monday)
and pick up a second serving job at a local tavern for ~10–15 hours/week (Thursday/Friday/Saturday)?
Or would it be smarter to wait until I hit 1 year at Olive Garden before expanding elsewhere?
Or should I just fully leave OG and move on?
For context, I’m in a major metro area.