Tales of a Waitress: Stereotyping Tippers (College Students)

College Students

When college students walk into the restraunt I jump at the opportunity to serve them. College kids always seem to be consistently big tippers (percentage wise). We have talked about this trend and have come up with two theories: first is that these customers know/remember what it is like to make minimun wage and second is that we all just feel more comfortable with this type of cutomers.

Even though college students tend to be the poorest they are usually the ones who have saved me in my overall tipping percentage for the night. The main reason for this is because they see servers as equals. Once again this could because they remember what it is like to make little money or we as servers treat them as equals.

Being treated as equals has a much larger effect on tipping then expected. Think about it...Lets say that someone we just met at a party has gotten you food. Not only have they gotten us food but they have also gotten us a drink and continually refilled that drink. What do we think of this person? (They are so super nice) In fact we may offer them something like a ride home, or to return the favor or...I don't know...pay them money. We WANT to do that for the person because they were so kind and thoughtful, so why is it different with servers. It is because we feel we HAVE to.

Don't get what I'm saying? Let me try again.

American Idol. We watch people sing and we all of a sudden become singing experts. "Oh she didn't hold out that note long enough. Not great use of air. He definitely should have chosen a better song. Those judges don't know what they are talking about." Um...what? Are we singing experts? Who are we to say who should stay and who should go? Well we feel we have knowledge (and right) to say and think these things because we were asked to make these judgement by voting for our favorite. There were no guidlines to how we are to pick our favorite so many of us go to the "superior" or "expert" role to determine who we like best.

Same with tipping. We make up guidelines of how someone should serve us...but thats just it...they are SERVING us. If we didn't feel obligated to tip them than we probably would be more grateful and more forgiving of server's flaws. Some people tend to take the "superior" or "expert" role when trying to determine tipping when they are not trained in the art of waitressing.

College students seem to be missing this idea. I don't know why but it seems that they still understand that they are being served and that the server isn't actually trying to make their food come out wrong or not refilling your drink enough.

Hey basically what I'm trying to say is that college kids tend to tip well. That is all.

{chels}