cook

event specialist

fine dining server

porter

line cook

Oliver & Bonacini

What is the best part of working at the company?
Good downtown location, 50% discount at restaurants, hires great employees but cannot keep them

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Overall Experience
Disappointing. While there were opportunities to learn due to the volume of work, the overall environment felt unsustainable and undervaluing of employees.

Workload & Expectations
Employees are consistently overworked, with expectations that often exceed reasonable capacity. Deadlines and deliverables continue to pile up without adjustments to workload or resources, leading to frequent burnout.

Role & Duites
Expectation is to sell the event, plus plan the entire thing - basically you are doing 2 full time jobs for not even a decent full time salary. Insane workload is an understatement. 

Compensation & Incentives
Pay is significantly below industry standards and not competitive for the level of work required. Incentives are minimal and often feel out of touch—efforts are sometimes “rewarded” with low-value gestures (like company pizza parties) rather than meaningful compensation or recognition.

Management & Leadership
Management does not provide adequate support or advocacy for employees. There is a noticeable lack of appreciation, communication, and effort to address concerns. Employees often feel like their contributions go unnoticed and undervalued.

Growth & Recognition
Opportunities for advancement or professional growth are limited. Hard work does not reliably translate into recognition, promotions, or salary increases, which is discouraging over time.

Workplace Culture
The culture tends to prioritize output over employee well-being. Morale is impacted by the imbalance between effort and reward, and there is little emphasis on fostering a positive or supportive work environment.

Final Thoughts
This company may provide short-term experience, but the long-term sustainability and employee satisfaction are lacking. Improvements in compensation, workload management, and leadership support would be necessary to make it a more desirable place to work.

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
The work environment is fast-paced and demanding, with a strong emphasis on output deadlines and quarter targets to hit. Employees are often expected to manage heavy workloads, which can make the day-to-day feel high-pressure and, at times, overwhelming.

The culture tends to prioritize productivity over employee well-being. While there may be occasional attempts at recognition (a printed piece of paper for hitting a goal or a $25 Uber giftcard), they often come in the form of small gestures rather than meaningful rewards or support. It leave employees feeling undervalued despite their contributions.

Management support is limited, and communication around concerns or feedback is not effective (we'll talk about this after the busy season). Overall the atmosphere feels lacking in appreciation, growth opportunities, and genuine investment in employee success.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
A typical day is fast-paced and workload-heavy. Most of the day is spent juggling multiple tasks, responding to urgent requests, and trying to keep up. There’s a need to adapt on short notice while still managing an already full plate.

There’s limited downtime, and it’s common to feel pressure to stay on top of a high volume of work. Support from management can be minimal, so a lot of problem-solving and prioritization falls on individual employees.

Overall, the day-to-day experience is demanding, with a strong focus on productivity and output rather than balance or long-term sustainability.

Oliver & Bonacini cafe Grill in Oakville is a fun place to work. Amazing camaraderie within the staff, fun managers who still know how to get down to business, as well as great clientele. A typical day at work would consist of going in, doing the position I was assigned for the day (server, server assistant, hostess or bartender) for about 2-3 hours, and then heading down to the office to do administrative jobs that were assigned to me (menu, Human Resources related, and other administrative tasks within the restaurant). I would then head back up to the restaurant floor after 2-3 hours to see what role I was assigned to for the evening shift. 

My coworkers and managers were amazing. They were very supportive and helped me with anything and everything I needed help with. They praised me for hard work and encouraged me instead of discouraging me when I made mistakes. They were all lots of fun to be with.

The hardest part of the job was dealing with difficult people under lots of pressure while the restaurant was busy. Although I learned a lot about the company, and dealing with these types of situations, it can still be challenging at times. But I was taught to believe there is nothing I cannot handle as long as I have the determination to do so.

I learned more than just that. I learned how to do many things in terms of administrative duties. I learned how to observe people during interviews, orientations, and the process of hiring and not hiring.

Altogether, this is a wonderful company with amazing management and coworkers, and I had a wonderful experience during my internship.

The morning would start with reviewing events from night before while follow ups to restaurants and clients regarding billing and over all experience of event. Inquires both incoming calls and emails would be answered within a timely manner. Confirmed bookings would be followed up for details and assistance with information about location, logistics, menu and costing and timelines. Tentative bookings would be followed up by providing information about all locations and recommended best venue locations based on best based on guests goals in their event planning needs. Contracts would require deposits and signage to confirm and restaurants would be updated with bookings and details for staffing and ordering purposes based on a weekly basis. Site requests are booked which means off site meetings with clients. The most enjoyable part of my job was meeting clients and providing them the event they had envision come to realization. The hardest part of this job was communicating last minute of changes based on clients requests, such as guest count and special requests that may have needed more time to execute with perfection and all parties involved in the know. Working with a team allowed us to share challenges and problem solve based on experience and knowledge about the restaurants and general managers and chef expectations.

What is the best part of working at the company?
Many great things about it. However. Lacks transparency and fairness .. something unknown to me was an issue for one or more managers, resulting in a termination without discussion. Even stranger, the term letter said “work shortage, not even a face to face goodbye. they cut off all communication. I found it shocking. Liked working there otherwise. 

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Travelling to difficult locations downtown  different every day, on unpaid time. 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
G neurally good, but apparently not reliably so behind the scenes. 

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Manic location finding, rapid setup, constant service, lots of cleaning, returning items to strange underground parking lots sometimes at 2:00 am after a long day.

I worked as a cook at Luma for two years. During those two years I learned more about cooking than during the preceding eight years which I had been cooking. 

The knowledge came at a cost, aside from the standard low wages and long hours I endured a boss who subjected us to extreme verbal abuse, and who would often throw things across the kitchen in fits of rage. 

The back of house staff were incredibly hard workers, and masters of their crafts. During events like TIFF and Summerlicious, which fall a month apart you will be expected to work every day for weeks, at 12 to 16 hours per day. 

If you want to learn how to cook and work with a team of very talented coworkers this may be the place for you, but the work-life balance proved untenable for many. 

Really enjoyed my time at Oliver and Bonacini. Unfortunately regardless of having more then 7 years as a server and bartender and staff that have worked for the company for 10+ years everyone is forced to do banquet shifts. These shift can result in 2-3 hour commuting time. Be as long as 13 hour shifts on your feet and not seeing the tips from the event for 5+ weeks. The team is great and management is lovely but the unrealistic expectations for their managers hours wise and responsibility created a lack of attention to general floor flow. 

My background is in fine dining and I've been a server for over 13 years. So, it came as a major surprise when myself, another colleague and a third (who has a child under five) were all fired from The Guild "without cause." None of us had been sat down previously to discuss any concerns with our performance or constructive ways to improve. In my opinion, all three of us are willing to learn and develop in our careers, so it's baffling that we were seen as obstacles to the restaurant "moving in a new direction" (the  excuse given to all three of us). 

If you want to work somewhere where your experience and skills are taken for granted, you're treated as completely disposable and not invested in or developed by management, this is the place.

O&B Blue mountain is a great place for those who seek a challenging yet simple job. I had applied for the dishwasher position ( though, it was cut short due in part to covid-19) and was impressed with how simple the task was. The staff you get to work with morning or night are amazing people who take pride in their work even with such a small task as dicing onions. The food is amazing ( highly recommend the mac and cheese) and you can have a chance to progress from one position to the next I.e dishwasher to line prep. All in all, the job was what I needed to get back on my feet.


What is the best part of working at the company?
Work ethic and non belief in cutting corners.  It is a learning experience as they believing in having a coachable approach 

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
The lack of hours due to the nature of the business

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
It is very fair and believes in following protocol to maintain decorum and a smooth working day

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
It is varied on the kind of day it is 
And also a faster day happens if we get too much on the plate

I was with O&B in their Off-site catering sales department.  The position allowed me to conduct various special events in mostly downtown Toronto premises.  The management was accommodating in terms of work-life flexibility, providing us with a laptop and options to work from home as required.   As is the case with many large corporate settings, there are numerous levels to report to, which at times was challenging and not as well designed for an often-last-minute nature of off-premise catering sales.    However, overall I felt well supported during my tenure at this company.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Cook 1 salary reported	$18.20 per hour
Event specialist 7 salaries reported	$52,286 per year
Fine dining server 10 salaries reported	$20.20 per hour
Porter 7 salaries reported	$20.57 per hour
Line cook 2 salaries reported	$19.38 per hour

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Working at Oliver &amp; Bonacini: company overview and reviews

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