I’ve noticed that valet car parkers seem to inspire alternating feelings of road rage and gratitude among diners.
A Houston Chronicle story from June headlined “Valet service is a ‘necessary evil’ in busy parts of the city,” confirmed my suspicions about the love-hate relationship that I and many others have with the uniformed sentinels so eager to take your keys, car and trust.
Mark Sullivan, who owns a Houston marketing and public-relations agency with many restaurant clients and has been very helpful to me over the years, was quoted as saying, “Valet parking is definitely a lightning rod.”
Lonnie Schiller of the Schiller Del Grande Restaurant Group, which owns The Grove, The Lake House and RDG + Bar Annie in Houston, said restaurants frequently lose money on valet parking because of costs such as garage rental and labor.
I, for one, will go out of my way to avoid valet parking, but sometimes it’s just unavoidable.
What really gets stuck in my gearbox are the suburban restaurants surrounded like a floating island by a sea of open parking spaces that still direct prospective patrons through a maze of orange traffic cones to the valet parker’s kiosk at the front door. While they may be thinking it portrays their eatery as a hot ticket, to me it signals such operations as woefully disconnected from reality.
One customer who generally appreciates having the valet option available told me: “I’m unreasonably annoyed at those in any suburban location, especially when the restaurant is located in a strip center where the whole idea was to provide plenty of free parking — pretentious!”
For every fan of valets, such as a friend in Denver who told me that in that city “it is easier and cheaper to use the valet than to pay to park and walk several blocks,” there is a car-park curmudgeon. One recently shared: “I won’t go to a restaurant that only has valet parking. I don’t want someone else driving my car. I don’t want to wait for someone to retrieve my car while I stand by idly. I don’t want to tip someone to park my car a few inches from where I’m standing. I resent the way valet parking takes over close-in parking that I want to use.”
For every customer who feels she’s “not crazy about someone else getting in my car,” there’s another — especially among solo female customers — who like the concept.
There’s also the downside of theft. “Had expensive luggage stolen out of the trunk of my rental car by valets in Los Angeles,” said one acquaintance. There’s also potential damage — the “newish car had been keyed,” said another.
Valets do provide a patina of “posh.” It makes guests feel like they are Hollywood royalty arriving in their Bentleys for the premiere of a blockbuster film.
But kicking the other side of the tire are those who consider it a nuisance, with valets parked in the best spots and forcing civilians into parking Siberia. My advice for not driving guests crazy: Consider car valets among your menu of services if it makes sense, and don’t make those who would prefer parking their own auto feel like second-class citizens forced to give up a personal freedom.
Contact Ron Ruggless at [email protected]