What do waiters call regular customers?

January 20, 2006 3:02 PM

Does anyone know any slang that waiters/waitresses use to refer to regular customers other than the obvious "regulars"?
posted by saraswati to Writing & Language (17 answers total)

In Seattle, they are called "horns" if they come in regularly just to drink. More of a bar than a restaurant term, though.
posted by luneray at 3:09 PM on January 20, 2006

In my restaurant experience, you would most often get to know the regulars by name. So, it wasn't "the regulars," it was "Harold," or "The IBM People," or "The Church group."

Then again, some of them were just "those fucking weirdos again."

Harold was famous in this one joint I worked at. He was the ONLY reason we carried Johnnie Walker Black, if you get my drift.
posted by frogan at 3:10 PM on January 20, 2006

Oh, I could also tell you long tales about nicknames we had for guests when I worked at Disneyland ... everything from "ducks" to "planes" to "bags," all with their own etymology ... but it's not the same thing.
posted by frogan at 3:15 PM on January 20, 2006

I remember the waitstaff calling the regulars by what they ate.

Mr. Chicken Salad Iced Tea No lemon
posted by Bighappyfunhouse at 3:20 PM on January 20, 2006

I remember lots of regular customers being referred to by what they ordered, or by their idiosyncrasies.

ie: " Pittsburg", "Extra garlic" , " Doggie-bag lady", " 10 %",... those kind of things
posted by lobstah at 3:24 PM on January 20, 2006

frogan: "Oh, I could also tell you long tales about nicknames we had for guests when I worked at Disneyland ... everything from "ducks" to "planes" to "bags," all with their own etymology ... but it's not the same thing."


I don't want to threadjack, but I don't think you can throw terms like those out without defining them....
posted by JMOZ at 3:27 PM on January 20, 2006

My experience mimics the other answers. We used proper names and descriptions.

And, yeah, I totally want to know the etymology of those Disneyland names.
posted by birdie birdington at 3:38 PM on January 20, 2006

I don't want to threadjack, but I don't think you can throw terms like those out without defining them....

Mind you, these are from the mid-80s. Go back today and they're probably speaking another language.

Ducks = People watching the parades, especially those that showed up really, really early to stake out territorial claims. The name refers to their tendency to sit on the curbs (ducks in a row) and/or the fact that for some reason, people waiting for a parade could be ordered around easily. "You can't stand here. You wanna stay here, you have to sit down. If you wanna stand, go to Fantasyland." "Uhh, OK." (entire family of 15 immediately hits the deck).

Planes = Widebodies = Fat people. What you really want is Help (see below). Planes are also out-and-out dangerous on the canoes. Because they could conceiveably sink them. Happened twice one summer.

Bags = People who would carry around bags of purchased items (gifts, stuffed animals, etc), all freakin' day long, and needed places to store said goods. "Tell the bags they can't carry that stuff on the ride."

Chairs = People in wheelchairs and their families. This term wasn't pejorative, just a shorthand. "Chairs coming around the other side."

Help = Hot girls. If you were doing Group ("How many in your party? Four? Take rows 1 and 2."), you tried to direct the Help toward a co-worker who might want to flirt with them. "Dude, I'm bored. I need Help. Help me out here."
posted by frogan at 3:39 PM on January 20, 2006

We called the chronic coffee drinkers "slugs", it wasn't meant to be nice.
posted by yodelingisfun at 3:48 PM on January 20, 2006

civilians.. of course that could have been because a number of the people I worked with were ex-military
posted by KirTakat at 4:18 PM on January 20, 2006

We called the retirees who came in to eat at 5:30pm the "early bird specials".
posted by fshgrl at 6:16 PM on January 20, 2006

Ha, if i'm remembering correctly, once a friend of mine worked at a restaurant where they called the servers wait-trons, the kitchen staff cook-trons, and the customers pay-trons. Pronounce them if it's not immediately at least a little amusing.
posted by pullayup at 6:43 PM on January 20, 2006

When a customer or party of X came in and asked for a specific server, we referred to him/them as a "call party" -- as in they were "calling" for a specific waiter/waitress.
posted by davidmsc at 6:48 PM on January 20, 2006

We called the chronic coffee drinkers "slugs", it wasn't meant to be nice.

But I'm a chronic coffee drinker. :(
posted by Eamon at 8:35 PM on January 20, 2006

At the restaurant where I cook, if we don't know them by name (small town), we call them by their habits - we've got the "two combos and a diet pepsi" guy (as in combination, i.e. beef and bean, burritos), the "two large twist cones" couple (they usually come through the drive-thru, and always tip like a buck and a half), the "chocolate shake made with chocolate soft serve" (as opposed to shake mix+chocolate syrup) lady, etc.
posted by attercoppe at 9:28 PM on January 20, 2006

Google restaurant lingo...
posted by kgn2507 at 4:09 AM on January 21, 2006

I had a friend who called them "habitue."

Sometimes, he'd say "habitue with a capitol 'B'." (You have to say it out loud.)
posted by jimfl at 8:33 AM on January 21, 2006