Tim Hortons is in hot water – and I don’t mean coffee.
When the Ontario government bumped the minimum wage up from $11.60 an hour to $14.00 an hour, some Tim Hortons outlets slashed hours and benefits for their staff, who ended up getting a pay cut instead of an increase.
A deluge of criticism followed, in newspapers, and in online petitions.
Disclosure: I do not own shares in Tim Hortons or its parent companies, Restaurant Brands International and 3G Capital, a Brazilian investment giant. But I am a Tim Hortons customer. And my daughter worked for Tim’s for a few years.
The policies that earned scathing editorial comments happened at a minority of Tim’s franchises – perhaps a couple of dozen, all in Ontario.
Tim Hortons was founded by – surprise! -- Tim Horton, a player with the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team. Horton was later joined by investor Ron Joyce, who expanded the chain beyond its Ontario roots until it now has over 4,600 franchised outlets around the world.
Found everywhere
Tim Hortons now dominates the coffee business in Canada, selling ten times as much as Starbucks! Long ago Tim’s surpassed McDonald’s in Canada for its number of franchises. In addition, the chain expanded the Canadian vocabulary with the term, “double-double” -- coffee with double cream, double sugar. According to Wikipedia, Canada has the highest per-capita ratio of donut shops of any nation.
Years ago, author Pierre Berton defined the two most Canadian institutions as the NHL and the United Church. Today, he would probably name Tim Hortons.
Over the years, the chain’s ownership has gone through the usual high-level flip-flopping as investors cash in. But the local stores are not owned by the chain. They’re owned by individual franchisees. The fee for a franchise varies, but it is commonly called a licence to print money; if you can’t earn your investment back in two years, you’re considered a failure.
In 2011, Maclean’s magazine reported that the average franchise returned $265,000 a year.
Differing responsibilities
The parent company decides what products the retail outlets will sell, for how much. It even dictates the brand of paper napkins used. Donuts used to be locally baked, fresh every morning; today, they are partly pre-cooked in a plant in Brampton, Ontario, and shipped frozen to franchises.
The parent company also controls advertising. And it sets some policies – for example, that drive-through customers take priority over walk-ins.
Employment standards, on the other hand, are up to the local franchise. Which makes sense, because they have to deal with varying provincial labour regulations. But that also puts them in a bind. Because when a province raises the minimum wage, local franchises have can’t simply pass extra costs on to consumers, because the parent company controls pricing.
Personally, I think the Ontario franchises tried the wrong solution. If you reduce staff and services when wages go up this time, what will you do the next time? Keep on cutting back until you have no customers left?
The real victims
The staff are the bottom end of the feeding chain. Most of them are paid minimum wage. In Ontario, now $14 an hour; in B.C., still $11.35 an hour; in Saskatchewan, just $10.96.
Even with full-time work, 40 hours a week and no holidays or days off, a Tim’s employee in B.C. can’t earn more than $23,000. Possibly enough for a single person, renting a room in a boarding house. But a mom with two kids will have to pay $1200 a month just for an apartment here.
And some franchise owners manipulate work schedules so that no employee works more than 20 hours a week, and never qualifies for benefits. Half-time work drops a B.C. employee’s income to under $12,000 a year. Waaaaay below the poverty line.
My sympathies lie with the workers.
Three principles seem to emerge from this welter of information.
The parent company doesn’t care about its franchisees or their employees. It cares only about the Tim Hortons brand. It’s the brand that’s saleable. To new franchisees. And to even bigger companies.
The franchise owners don’t care about their employees. Or their customers. They care about the return on investment that they feel entitled to.
Yes, they’ve taken a financial risk. But they’re not entrepreneurs, creating something new; they’re buying into an established brand.
The employees are not entitled to anything.
I don’t think that’s fair. If I have to pay an extra 25 cents for a cup of coffee, or ten cents more for a donut, so that a part-time employee can benefit from an increase in the minimum wage, so be it.
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Copyright © 2017 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups encouraged; links from other blogs welcomed; all other rights reserved.
To send comments, to subscribe, or to unsubscribe, write jimt@quixotic.ca
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YOUR TURN
Okay, I wasn’t really serious about kryptonite in last week’s Sharp Edges – it was more a way of getting into the subject of determining what’s important, and what isn’t.
David Gilchrist got the point: “This one is close to home! Coming 90 in a few weeks, I am trying to decide what to do with a lifetime of accumulation - -to save my kids from the chore you mention in this column: my father’s old movie camera, my slide projector, etc. My son has tried to deal with some of the issue you mention, and transferred 1000+ slides to a CD. But what will they mean to my grandchildren who never knew my parents? Much as I sorrowfully realize they are expendable, you are mostly correct.
“But let’s not throw out the baby with the bathwater. You made me think about Popeye; and it has occurred to me that he was a parable in his day. I hated (and still dislike) spinach; but it is full of iron and a very important vegetable -- especially for anyone who is anemic. I suspect that the originator was using a bit of hyperbole to enhance the image of Spinach to some fussy eater (like me) - -perhaps a child or grandchild of the writer. Not everything old is worth preserving, it is true; but maybe, like the parables of Jesus, some of the stories (like Aesop’s Fables and perhaps even the Popeye comic strip) may not be worthless either.”
Frank Martens emphasized saving that which is worthwhile: “There have been several articles recently about preparing for one’s death by ridding yourself of all your belongings to save your offspring from having that odious chore.
“What would have happened to the all the great paintings by Michelangelo or the statue of David if someone had not made the effort to save them from extinction?
“There are many things that are precious enough to be passed on from generation to generation.
I’m a bit of a collector myself of antiques as well as art. Thank goodness that my children have inherited my obsession. This world would be a very monotonous place if all our furniture was made by Ikea, or all of art consisted just of prints.”
Steve Roney offered a warning: “Political charlatans and potential tyrants are at constant work to falsify the past in order to drive their agendas. We need to preserve all the evidence we can of the truth of the past to protect against this. Orwell said it best: ‘Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.’”
Tom Watson wanted an exception: “I have no trouble whatsoever discarding old notions. In fact, I've done so with many over my time...which, incidentally, has been long enough to remember Fibber McGee's closet. But when it comes to my eight-track tapes, now that's another matter!”
And Marilyn Stone wrote, “Ralph is under-estimating ages. I am 71 and I remember Fibber Magee”
Laurna Tallman though I was mixing things up: “Popeye's spinach and the Biblical accounts of God and the Creation are not in the same category.
“The language in the Bible describes concepts that are intrinsically enduring because they remain of interest. They describe human neurology and thought processes and behaviour in the language of those times. They are artifacts of the human journey and are worthy of continuing study. They are a living legacy insofar as people do not change. My discoveries about human anatomy were grounded in concepts both ancient and modern. I can explain the Biblical accounts in modern language because I have studied both streams of consciousness.
“I was read Popeye comic strips by older relatives when I was a child so the interminable film starring Robin Williams was richly entertaining for me. As a trained analyst of literature and film, I could write essays on the strip and on the film. Those artistic renderings that emphasize a generation or two of hardship in North America have an entirely different purpose from the archetypal Biblical stories that attempt to express profound and enduring realities about nature and about humankind, although Popeye occasionally attains that depth. We need those ancient touchstones to take the measure of who we are and of who we have become. We need a slice of Popeye for the same reason.
Isabel Gibson looked at implications: “I wonder whether we hang onto outdated ideas because we're inclined to be too concrete or literal, rather than seeing through the specific to the abstract principle or concept underlying it.
“So, for example, we can't give up kosher food rules without giving up all commitment to the abstract concept of purity or the pragmatic principle that clean food builds good health.
“Or we can't give up rigid rules of behaviour without abandoning all social restraint.
“Or we can't let go of a God in the sky without losing the notion that life is about something beyond ourselves.”
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TECHNICAL STUFF
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PROMOTION STUFF…
To use the links in this section, you’ll have to insert the necessary symbols.
Ralph Milton ’s latest project is called “Sing Hallelujah” -- the world’s first video hymnal. It consists of 100 popular hymns, both new and old, on five DVDs that can be played using a standard DVD player and TV screen, for use in congregations who lack skilled musicians to play piano or organ. More details at wwwDOTsinghallelujahDOTca
Ralph’s HymnSight webpage is still up, http://wwwDOThymnsightDOTca, with a vast gallery of photos you can use to enhance the appearance of the visual images you project for liturgical use (prayers, responses, hymn verses, etc.)
Wayne Irwin's “Churchweb Canada,” an inexpensive service for any congregation wanting to develop a web presence, with free consultation. <http://wwwDOTchurchwebcanadaDOTca>
I recommend Isabel Gibson’s thoughtful and well-written blog, wwwDOTtraditionaliconoclastDOTcom
Alva Wood’s satiric stories about incompetent bureaucrats and prejudiced attitudes in a small town -- not particularly religious, but fun; alvawoodATgmailDOTcom to get onto her mailing list.
Tom Watson writes a weekly blog called “The View from Grandpa Tom’s Balcony” -- ruminations on various subjects, and feedback from Tom’s readers. Write him at tomwatsoATgmailDOTcom or twatsonATsentexDOTnet