Creating a More Equitable Restaurant Model: Interview with Seth and Zachary Pacleb of Pidgin Cooperative

“Restaurants have always had the potential to be very toxic and inequitable, very hierarchical. Kitchen brigade is built off of the military and so it's very top down…With this [cooperative] model, this will allow somebody to be a part of a business that they're morally aligned with…and allowing them to work towards a point where they're seeing the full profits or benefits of the labor hours that they put into this business.”

-Zachary Pacleb

If you’ve ever been to the Ballard Farmer’s Market, you’ve likely seen long lines at the popular food stand, “Ramen and Tacos,” featuring a mash-up of global flavors made from scratch like kimchi on tacos or curry in ramen. The cultural blend of flavors was inspired by chefs and brothers Seth and Zachary Pacleb who grew up in a mixed race Filipino and White family. They are based in the Pacific Northwest but also spend a lot of time in Hawaii where their family currently resides. This serves as inspiration for their food’s Filipino-Hawaiian flavor profile.

While the brothers both worked as chefs at well-known restaurants, it was through their Ramen and Tacos stand that they were able to fully express themselves through food, as well as learn important lessons from the relationships they developed with the farmers at the market. Zachary explains,

“We started to find this very symbiotic model of cooking food at the markets and then feeding the farmers that were there and trading them for produce and other goods and then a lot of times, using those vegetables or those ingredients in the next weeks. And it was this nice, beautiful cycle of feeding the community without actually exchanging any real currency.” Seth adds, “We were already trying to be locally focused and seasonal, but it really sealed the deal. If we wanted to trade with them, we had to take whatever they had on hand.”

Seth and Zachary dreamed of opening a restaurant during this time but were forced to slow down their plans during the pandemic, which gave them time to more thoughtfully plan and have conversations about the industry with friends in the restaurant. They thought a lot about the problems, especially the lack of opportunities for workers. Seth explains,

“There’s only so far you can climb the ladder. It's very unlikely that you're going to get actual equity in the business. We have friends who have been promised things by restaurant group owners and then got screwed—they helped them open several successful restaurants… We can only open so many restaurants in the city and there aren’t opportunities for people to make a career, in this field, without opening your own business.”

The brothers also pointed to the problems of restaurant culture which Zachary explains creates real harm for workers,

“Restaurants have always had the potential to be very toxic and inequitable, very hierarchical. Kitchen brigade is built off of the military and so it's very top down. And I think for people who are creative in the industry and who want to feel like their labor is going towards something that they believe in, it's very difficult to find a model that aligns with those values and those desires.” Seth adds, “There are good owners out there, but I think it's hard to escape from the toxic and inequitable things that come out of a traditional hierarchical restaurant model. It’s the system, not necessarily the people. There's only so much you can do within that system.”

Seth and Zachary first considered opening a restaurant using a worker-owned, cooperative model when they were assigned to business coach Devra Gartenstein through Business Impact Northwest. Devra is co-owner of Patty Pan, one of two worker-owned restaurants in Seattle (the other is Jude’s Old Town). They were apprehensive at first but eventually got on board after conversations with Devra about how cooperative restaurants are structured and work.  One of the key differences the brothers highlight is how this model both values and benefits workers. Seth explains,

“This felt like a good way for us to be able to value every person that works in the restaurant—like anybody who's worked a shift where the dishwasher has called out knows how important that role is.” Zachary adds, “I think one of the things that we noticed was a no brainer in regards to not only allowing, in making this transition, our staff that has been with us for a long time to then be able to move towards that level of equity in the business that they've contributed to for so long, but also trying to establish a new model for the industry at large.”

Valuing employees and giving employees a stake in the business means there is also an accompanying cultural shift. Seth describes how,

“The more people that are owners and have a stake in what's going on, everybody has more of a say in their day to day work life… If something isn't working, they don't have to have a fear of being fired or reprimanded or ignored. They're going to have an actual voice in how to solve that problem, and it's going to be a lot more likely that everybody else is just going to be like…how do we solve this? And it becomes a collaborative process of how to deal with the problems that [usually] largely just get swept under the rug.”

Seth and Zachary are hopeful that their restaurant model and, hopefully, future success will inspire others in the industry to open worker-owned restaurants. Seth explains,

“I will say for myself that I have a lot of issues with capitalism, especially such as it is in our times right now. I understand that it’s not likely to shift to something else in my lifetime, but you have to be the change you want to see. While we can’t exist outside of a capitalist system, we can come up with more equitable ways to work, live, and coexist together…I do hope this is something that starts to catch fire.”

Zachery has hope for the food industry, sharing,

 “We've learned a lot about the resiliency of cooperatives around the world from our lawyer Cheryl Markham of Peoples Community Law and, because she's done a lot of independent research…where she got to travel to a couple places and just hearing about how successful and sustainable the business model is at large. There are some worker-owned cooperatives in Seattle, but not many in food so I think it's just the application of it in the food industry…I think our industry is more than ready for this type of transition, for this type of model, and we're all for it.”

Pidgin Cooperative founding team from left to right: Spencer R., Erica R., AM, Tiffany R., Zachary, Seth

The brothers, along with their founding team under the name Pidgin Cooperative, have secured a place in the Fisherman’s Terminal and are running a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds to remodel the space and buy equipment. To view their Kickstarter video, which harkens back to nostalgic educational PBS shows, and to contribute to their campaign, visit the Pidgin Cooperative Kickstarter page.