Pros
Working in wine country with beautiful views.
Cons
The business side of things is so messed up and they omit telling you important details of how you get paid. This is what you want to know before applying:
1. Ponzi takes 50% of your service charge .. 50%! In the past our Event Manager would divvy up the tips based on hours worked. However, Maria Ponzi can also decide to screw all logic and decide how your share will look. When she is involved there is no rationale to her tip disbursements... No logic, other than perhaps if she likes your or not. She has started tipping out the chef out of your portion too. Never an explanation of why you are hundreds of dollars short on your paycheck. Checking in with Accounting has said it was Maria's decision.
2. For Ponzi hosted events she will pay a flat rate of $15.00/hr. They did not tell me this nor any of the event staff. Surprise! These are some of the hardest working events and not only are you executing the event under the watchful eye of the Ponzi's but also being the dishwasher (glassware, utensils, plates, serving platters, chefs dishes), and janitor (cleaning the bathrooms, cleaning the dishpit, moving furniture back and forth, sweeping, mopping, cleaning outside tables, washing the windows.) to these larger scale events. It is not an option to not work these events which has been a deal breaker for event staff so they pull people in from the tasting room on a whim.
3. High Turnover .. not only in events. The only veterans are the vineyard workers and that is attributed to Nancy Ponzi and her SALUD foundation.
4. Pretentious environment.
5. It wasn't until I asked to see the accounting of events that I saw they were withholding personal event gratuity. Is this legal?
6. Angry texts and e-mails on your day off to do something... I was not paid salary.