Tom Hart is not your typical foodservice careerist. In an industry famous for brief tenures and blink-of-the-eye career shifts, Hart has been associated with one company for more than 33 years—the last 25 of those in a one position: general manager of the high-grossing Smith & Wollensky steakhouse in New York City.
After working in a series of places in New York City, the Catskills and Cape Cod, Hart took a job in 1976 at Tuesday’s, owned at the time by New York operator Alan Stillman, the founder of T.G.I. Friday’s. When Stillman and his partners bought Manny Wolf’s Steakhouse and converted it to Smith & Wollensky in 1977, Hart was part of the opening staff. Over the years, he advanced through a number of positions, including assistant steward, steward, kitchen manager, assistant floor manager and general manager of Wollensky’s Grill. Finally, in 1984, Stillman named Hart general manager of Smith & Wollensky.
You’ve been at Smith & Wollensky a long time. How do you account for your longevity?
Alan is a great guy to work for. So was Mike Byrne [the former director of operations, now retired]. They allowed me to do the job the way I thought it should be done. Alan let’s me run the place. And the company takes good care of me.
You’re not alone in having a long tenure there either.
No. Six people on the staff have been with me since day one—the chef, some cooks and managers. And then there are over 15 guys who have been here for 25 years or more.
How do you motivate your employees?
At the end of the day, it’s kind of simple. If you treat employees correctly, they will respond to you in the same way. If they’re happy, they will treat the customers well. We have an incredible amount of repeat customers—we’re already into a third generation of customers now.
How many people work for you?
There are 220 people in the building, and 14 or 15 different nationalities.
Is there much turnover?
No. This is a union house. The back-of-the-house rarely turns over. We promote from within, so there is not much change at all there. There is a little more turnover in the front-of-the-house, but again we try to promote from within, so one or two people at the bottom of the ladder may change a little.
Times are tough in New York for fine dining right now. How’s business?
We’re off by about 15 percent from 2008—which actually was a record year for us, despite [decreased sales in] October, November and December. And I’ve seen some good signs in the last couple of weeks. Spending seems to be up a bit. So we’re in pretty good shape.