6 ms·

Devil's Advocate: It's certain that Jimmy John's line-worker can't start a 2,000 store chain, but they could run off with some of the catering business.

bsbechtel 12y ago
Jimmy John's competes with every local restaurant in every local market where it operates. Someone can easily start a local business that cuts into the market share of one of its local stores, although yes, it's very unlikely that restaurant is going to overtake Jimmy John's nationally. And yes, many local businesses, especially restaurant businesses, are started by former employees who enter a field to get training, but one day want to open their own business. It's obvious many of the comments (and my downvotes) here are from individuals who have never ran, nor worked in, a business that operates and competes on a local scale.
- johnward 12y ago
  I didn't up or downvote you but from my perspective I don't feel that employers deserve more protections. If I want to run off with the secret recipe it's already protected by IP laws. I think it should be illegal for an employer to limit your future employment in any way. I'm not saying the restaurant industry isn't competitive, it's probably one of the most competitive I can think of, but limiting employees rights is not the right way to handle that.
  - bsbechtel 12y ago
    At JJ, it was more about operational secrets that can't be protected by law. However, I mentioned in my original post that I don't necessarily think it's right or wrong, it's just why JJ does it. I generally agree with you that limiting future employment is generally not a good thing, although I'm not convinced getting rid of non-competes in minimum wage jobs would materially affect wages. At most, it might prevent someone from taking a manager position at Subway, but I don't think it is going to raise the overall wages of restaurant workers.
    - tptacek 12y ago
      Jimmy Johns is a franchise operation with tens of thousands of employees. Their retail workers do not have access to meaningful "operational secrets". It wouldn't matter if they did, either: trade secrets can be protected directly without noncompetes.
- tptacek 12y ago
  I work in a fiercely competitive space in which the modal vector for company formation is employees of competing companies leaving to start them. The idea that Jimmy Johns could expect the right to bind minimum-wage-earning food service workers with a noncompete is verkakte. Even in circumstances where employees are given access to trade secrets and client rolodexes, noncompete agreements are difficult to enforce and almost invariably slashed to bits by courts when they survive at all. Obviously, Jimmy Johns will not prevail in enforcing a noncompete on a minimum-wage employee. What they're doing is simply intimidating their own workers, probably based on some simple calculation about the impact their bogus noncompete will have on employee turnover, which is a metric every at-scale retail business optimizes for. It is easy to devise logically-consistent reasons Jimmy Johns would want to bind their employees with anti-competitive contracts. Such arguments more or less beg the question.
jackmaney 12y ago
If Jimmy John's can't compete with a fly-by-night catering business started by a former worker, then why shouldn't Jimmy John's fail?

bsbechtel 12y ago

Jimmy John's competes with every local restaurant in every local market where it operates. Someone can easily start a local business that cuts into the market share of one of its local stores, although yes, it's very unlikely that restaurant is going to overtake Jimmy John's nationally. And yes, many local businesses, especially restaurant businesses, are started by former employees who enter a field to get training, but one day want to open their own business. It's obvious many of the comments (and my downvotes) here are from individuals who have never ran, nor worked in, a business that operates and competes on a local scale.

johnward 12y ago
I didn't up or downvote you but from my perspective I don't feel that employers deserve more protections. If I want to run off with the secret recipe it's already protected by IP laws. I think it should be illegal for an employer to limit your future employment in any way. I'm not saying the restaurant industry isn't competitive, it's probably one of the most competitive I can think of, but limiting employees rights is not the right way to handle that.
- bsbechtel 12y ago
  At JJ, it was more about operational secrets that can't be protected by law. However, I mentioned in my original post that I don't necessarily think it's right or wrong, it's just why JJ does it. I generally agree with you that limiting future employment is generally not a good thing, although I'm not convinced getting rid of non-competes in minimum wage jobs would materially affect wages. At most, it might prevent someone from taking a manager position at Subway, but I don't think it is going to raise the overall wages of restaurant workers.
  - tptacek 12y ago
    Jimmy Johns is a franchise operation with tens of thousands of employees. Their retail workers do not have access to meaningful "operational secrets". It wouldn't matter if they did, either: trade secrets can be protected directly without noncompetes.
tptacek 12y ago
I work in a fiercely competitive space in which the modal vector for company formation is employees of competing companies leaving to start them. The idea that Jimmy Johns could expect the right to bind minimum-wage-earning food service workers with a noncompete is verkakte. Even in circumstances where employees are given access to trade secrets and client rolodexes, noncompete agreements are difficult to enforce and almost invariably slashed to bits by courts when they survive at all. Obviously, Jimmy Johns will not prevail in enforcing a noncompete on a minimum-wage employee. What they're doing is simply intimidating their own workers, probably based on some simple calculation about the impact their bogus noncompete will have on employee turnover, which is a metric every at-scale retail business optimizes for. It is easy to devise logically-consistent reasons Jimmy Johns would want to bind their employees with anti-competitive contracts. Such arguments more or less beg the question.

jackmaney 12y ago

If Jimmy John's can't compete with a fly-by-night catering business started by a former worker, then why shouldn't Jimmy John's fail?