Understaffed Restaurants Ask For Patience, Kindness From Customers

BOSTON (CBS) - Customers are noticing it and restaurant owners and staff are experiencing it: aggressive customers who seem to have misplaced their patience.

"There has been some testiness," said Melanie Goddard.

"We do get the occasional guest who, you know, gets frustrated," said Nimi Idnani, who owns Raleigh Wine Bar & Eatery in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

She's grateful to have her staff back, but says it's still an adjustment coming out of the pandemic.

"It's important to know we're kind of had to flip on a dime a couple of times now," said Idnani.

The owners of APT Cape Cod in Brewster were so fed up with rude customers they shut their doors completely for a day last week.

"Just an increase in kind of non-appropriate ways to talk to staff members," explained Brandi Felt Castillo of APT Cape Cod.

They closed, in part, to raise awareness about the need for kindness.

"We just decided that we would say 'no more,' like we're going to take the day. We're not going to open because, you know, our staff has value to us," said Felt Castellano.

The Massachusetts Restaurant Association expects service to return to normal as more bars and restaurants hire their staff back.

"Look, we all wish that it was February of 2020 again and none of this happened and we just go back to the way life was. Reality is it's taking not only the restaurant industry, but every industry, a little but of time to get there," said Massachusetts Restaurant Association President Bob Luz.