StingyTipper is a St. Louis-based rating service (and a product—see the StingyTipper S.E.R.V.I.C.E. Rating System) designed to empower the “average” diner who struggles with the perpetual dilemma of “How Much Should I Leave for a Tip on this Meal?”. It seeks to make the “art” of gratuity-giving more rational and logical and less stress-producing, helping to complement the entire dining experience. The focus of StingyTipper is on the service experience, not on food critique per se, providing a pathway for making informed, intelligent decisions about tipping service staff in dining and drinking establishments. If you have never experienced the dilemma of tipping appropriately, then this site is not for you.
Some people (i.e., my family and so-called friends) have accused the StingyTipper of being “overly frugal”—or stingy! Thus, the name. But I prefer to consider myself an aficionado of the 3-D approach to tipping: Deliberative, Discriminating and Discerning. The goal of StingerTipper is to raise the bar on the quality of service provided by wait staff throughout the dining/drinking establishments of St. Louis, so that they not only receive the gratuity they rightfully deserve, but the dining public is also treated to truly quality service.
Currently, there are only three criteria for being included in a StingyTipper review of service:
- It has to be a St. Louis locally owned and operated establishment, not a national chain.
- It has to be compliant with the newly passed no-smoking ordinances (i.e., will not include places with exemptions).
- It has to serve both food and alcoholic beverages (ST enjoys a brew or glass of wine with a meal!).
As a person in the “service industry” myself with a focus on quality assurance, I have great admiration and respect for people who wait on people -- “they’re the luckiest people in the world”! That’s because, through their commitment to quality service delivery, they have the potential to control both the amount of remuneration they receive for their service and the level of happiness and satisfaction experienced by those they serve. What a job!
My definition of success for the StingyTipper is threefold:
1) That the people who stumble upon this site will find it useful in their discernment process of determining where to go to eat or drink among the many fine establishments in the St. Louis area. And….that they will feel more at ease with the whole tipping dilemma.
2) That those who make their livelihood serving others their sustenance will be inspired to provide the best possible service they can and, therefore, will be handsomely compensated through appropriate gratuities.
3) That your tipping habits might transform from being stingy (please, no one wants that moniker!) to being 3-D focused: Deliberative, Discriminating and Discerning.
Disclaimers:
StingyTipper clearly acknowledges that an unsatisfactory service experience does not mean that the place where it was delivered is a bad eating/drinking establishment. One can have excellent food and lousy service--and vise-versa, of course. Obviously, it’s the combination of the two—food and service—that make for a special dine-out experience. StingyTipper is only concerned with the service portion of this equation, leaving the food critique to the food connoisseurs.
StingyTipper recognizes that one person’s bad experience with service is another person’s commendable experience. Everything is relative to the situation: the server to whom you were assigned, the timing of your visit, the mood of the diners, what’s happening in the kitchen with the chef, the physical layout of the restaurant, how crowded the establishment is during your visit, etc. Even the weather can predispose the outcome of a service experience. StingyTipper openly and readily acknowledges all of this. But StingyTipper does not pretend to be all-knowing or all-seeing. ST is just an “average jo” who has had the good fortune to dine out (often at employers’ expense) in hundreds of restaurants across the country--and in Ireland--and who has thus developed very strong opinions about service. StingyTipper was conceived as a way to put a framework around those opinions so they could be delivered not in a random way, but in a thoughtful, intentional and humorous manner that hopefully will enrich and enliven one’s total dining experience.
A final word: If you don’t like my opinions, this web site is not for you--but try not to be too stingy. It’s a tough world out there!
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