Life without Janitors - One Extra Worker through Efficiency

First Up - To those who have been sending crates my way, sorry I have been away for a couple of days, did not expect to be this busy about a Conference, nor to spend a night sleeping in the Office, but oh well the Event was fun.

Meantime, I was a little surprised to see notes in the forum about how having enough Toilets for the Restaurant Popularity to be kept at Max. Just for the Record, I'll devote a post to clearing this thing up.

And to you that means - One Extra Worker for either Cooking or Serving

1) Only 50% of Served Customers Use the Toilet

Yes, only about One out of Two Customers who have eaten or drank, need to use the toilet. Its really not that many.

2) Max Popularity = Thumbs-Up MORE Than Thumbs-Down

Assuming you already have Max Popularity, you only need 1 or more Thumbs-Up for 1 Thumbs-Down to remain at Max.

3) Without Toilets, Two Satisfied Customer = 1 Thumbs-Up
Hence, we get...

4) Max Popularity = Two Satisfied Customer for One Thumbs-Down

"Eh, so what?" some may say.

Simply put, if you can serve 66% of your Customers, you do NOT need Toilets to maintain Max Popularity.

While you could use the layout here, the following tips from the same post should also serve you reasonably.

1. One Stove can serve 3-4 tables effectively.
2. A Waiter can handle 3 Stoves or 2 Stoves 1 Drink Effectively while serving 8-9 Tables
3. Make the Islands for the Waiter Smaller, preferably 1x3.

So, there you go - Max Popularity Without Janitor!
Which also means you get One Extra Worker to Cook / Serve!

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Here come some other tricky bits without Janitors

1) Use Sushi Bar & Bowling Alley / Reduce Arcades

Like Toilets, over time Arcades WILL break down. Since you have no Janitor now, you won't want to Rely only on Arcades to keep Customers Busy.

If you have the Sushi Bar, and the Bowling Alley that is no longer Breakable (ie with the Display Signs), feel free to use them.

Meantime, for your Testing Purposes, you should not include any Arcades, or block off the Arcades, so you can collect coins but Customers can't use them.

You will probably want to provide a few more chairs as well.
As a general guideline, put 3 chair/table every 10 Popularity you have, rounded up, and of course ensure there is a waiter able to serve these tables quickly.
This is roughly 1 Chair per 1 Customer Entering every Minute.

2) Junk

Junk WILL Accumulate, and quite quickly, about 1 per hour for the first 4 hours, and slightly slower after that.
Without a Janitor, there'll be little you can do, except to clear manually. To help you in this :

1. If you Can't See a square, and its Not used for Walking / Serving, Block up the Square / Put something there so Junk can't accumulate. Candles and Water are both good.
2. If Popularity drops more than 1.0 from Max, when it was previously fine, look for Junk
3. Try to check for Junk every 8-12 Hours. Beyond this time, especially if you're on a 24 hour Shift, Popularity will start to drop.
4. If you still Can't Find Junk, AND its causing your Popularity to drop rapidly, switch to a Blank Layout, clear it, then switch back

3) Raising Popularity Quickly

It is likely that there will be times your Popularity falls, could be due to switching layout to one without Obelisks, or for other Reasons.
Regardless, you probably want your Popularity back to Max before you log off, so you can make more money while Offline.

To make that faster, its good to have a few toilets, say 5-6 around. Just clean Toilets manually to make Popularity increase faster.

Once Popularity is Maxed, let the Toilets get choked again.

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Ensuring it Works

So, how do you know it works / get it to work? There's only one way to be sure - TEST IT.

After you have changed your Layout to one that is relatively efficient, you should observe around 75% Efficiency, ie 3 out of 4 Customers being satisfied and giving Thumbs-Up, and Popularity is Maxed. At this point you can start to test.

1. Clear the Junk / Trash in your Restaurant.
2. Get Popularity Back up to Max, if required.
3. Remove / Block off all Arcades and Toilets.
4. Place 3 Chairs per 10 Popularity, rounded up.
5. Swap your Janitor to his new Role as Waiter / Cook, if required

Let your Restaurant run for about 3-4 minutes, or longer if you like.
If Popularity drops and remains low, then your design might not be efficient enough.

Yes, don't blame the number of Toilets, think about how to Tighten the Design as per the Tips above.
If it still doesn't work, stick closer to the Layout/Tips here.

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Well, that's about it, hope that helped you understand better and hopefully, get an Extra Worker by Converting your Janitor!

Cheers and Happy Halloween! :)

Best Stove & Worker Layout

An Ideal Layout in Restaurant City will ensure that you have the highest number of customers served per minute.
ie. It makes you the most money per minute

Just because it maintains Popularity / causes Popularity to go up, does not make it efficient. Of course, a good layout should also be Aesthetically pleasing :)

This post assumes that :

• you are not using PF Cash to purchase any stoves / drink machines
• there are no Drink Bars
• you have a max of 9 workers
• there are no Arcade Machines
• there are no Time-Extenders (Mariachi Band, Giant TV, Statue of Cookery, Bubble Drink Tower)

So how do I measure Efficiency?

1. Let the restaurant run for 1-2 minutes, until the customer flow is consistent.
2. Write down the amount of money
3. Wait another few minutes (2-3 minutes)
4. Write down the new amount of money
5. No. of Customers Served per Minute = ( New $ Amt - Old $ Amt ) / (Number of Minutes * $2 per Customer)

All the tests were done with the same account running at 70 Popularity, with 9 Staff. There's also a Sushi Bar I forgot to remove, but it probably didn't affect very much since no one ever goes to it. The stoves operate at about 3-4% improved speed (ie less than 1 second faster), and the drinks 4-5% improved speed.

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BEST Layout - 6 Cooks, 3 Workers (3 sets of 3 Workers)

9 Staff, having 3 sets of 3 workers (2 Cooks, 1 Waiter) each handling 9 tables.
Result = 17.5 Customers Served per Minute

Note that I'm only getting 21 customers entering per minute.
Plus, its without any other knick knacks like Giant TV, Mariachi Band, etc.

Its worth noting that due to improved speed of stoves & drinks on that account of mine, handling 9 became feasible. If using all regular stoves and drinks, suggest handling 8 seats or so.

For those who just want the answer to this Post, you can stop reading now :)

Note that if you're levelling a new account, at low levels before your Drinks are unlocked, you can have 1 waiter handle 3 stoves serving 9 tables while boxed into 3 squares. It should be more efficient than 1 waiter 2 stoves 1 drink, so it can directly handle 9 customers.

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Alternate Layout - 5 Cooks, 4 Workers

5 Cooks 4 Waiters in a Row, each Waiter having access to 2 stoves.
Result = 16.0 Customers Served per Minute

OR

5 Cooks 4 Waiters in a Rectangle, each Waiter having access to 3 Stoves.
Result = 15.5 Customers Served per Minute

There doesn't seem to be much difference in effectiveness of these 2, so yeah its really up to how you want to arrange it. This layout is really only an option for those who like to cluster up their entire cooking / eating area.

The principle of these 2 layouts is that each Waiter serves from more than 1 stove to 5 seats or so, so there's less chance at any one time that any customer will be dissatisfied and leave.
Regardless, its significantly behind the 3x3 Layout.

There's of course many other 5 Cooks 4 Waiter layouts, but these 2 are (theoretically) in my mind, the most efficient. The Row layout restricts the Waiter 2x1 squares each, the Rectangle keeps the waiter to 3x1 squares each. That may explain the better efficiency, though the difference of 0.5 Customer Served per minute is still pretty close.

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Waiter Efficiency Tips

• "Box Up" Waiter into an area of max 3x1 squares, or if you want to for aesthetics, 2x2 squares.
• When your Waiter is in the Centre square (for 3x1 squares), he can use the Drink Machine and both Stoves and serve at least 3 tables.
• Buy a few items that Extend Waiting Time (eg. Statue of Cookery, Mariachi Band, Giant TV, Drink Tower).
• Get Faster Drink Machines and Stoves (duh). I feel that faster Drink Machines are more crucial.

If you follow the above, you can serve 9 tables / chairs decently with 1 waiter, 2 cooks.

Other General Notes / Rules of Thumb

• One Stove can serve 3-4 tables effectively.
• A normal Stove takes 20 seconds to Cook a Meal.
• Hence using 6 Cooks, you can achieve max 18 Customers Served per minute, assuming NO drinks are ordered and Waiters INSTANTLY lift the food off the stove.
• At 17.5 Customers Served per minute, the 3x3 layout gets pretty close to that.
• Having many Tables / Chairs lead to many disappointed Customers. Use Arcades instead.
• If you can't afford Arcades (yet), put Chairs with no table in front of them for Customers to Wait

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Help, I can't get Waiters in the Right Places!

1. Arrange the whole set up, less Stoves
2. Place 1 Stove down for each 1 Waiter. The Waiter will appear directly in front of the Stove.
3. Save the Layout, Save the Game, Refresh.
4. After the game reloads, add in the remaining stoves. Do NOT touch the first few Stoves.
5. Save the Layout (waiters may be at wrong places at this time). Save the Game, Refresh.

Voila!

If you still have difficulty with the Waiters, see Playfish's guide on Island Layouts.