Food Safety: Safe House

Chevys Fresh Mex puts its pocketbook behind its food-safety promises.

By Christine Zimmerman, Contributing Editor -- Chain Leader, 3/1/2003

It’s one thing to talk about your accomplishments and quite another to lay out the proof. Chevys Fresh Mex has voluntarily incorporated the most stringent food-safety requirements established by health departments all over the country, according to Valerie Williamson, Chevys quality assurance manager. And she talks openly about the $400,000 the 173-unit casual-dining chain incurs every year to do so.

“Our food-safety expenses are like an insurance policy. It’s absolutely worth the cost,” says Williamson. The Emeryville, Calif.-based company follows the same practices at all of its concepts, including Rio Bravo Fresh Mex, Fuzio and Rio Bravo Cantina.

She maintains that it’s too easy for managers to lose sight of important details when they are dealing with day-to-day issues like employees that didn’t show up for work or a customer complaining out in the dining room.

“But really, we hold our guests’ lives in our hands. We owe it to them to be on guard,” says Williamson, who has a hospital foodservice background. “You realize a customer could be on chemotherapy or elderly or a small child. They could die from a foodborne illness.”

Sans Cans
The fact that Chevys uses only fresh ingredients increases its food-safety concerns exponentially, Williamson says. “Extensive handling of food by employees increases the potential for problems. Because we use only fresh produce, we also have to check for seasonal variations that affect quality and consistency,” she notes.

And raw foods don’t receive the barrier to microorganisms that cooking provides.

Chevys focuses heavily on minimizing bare-hand contact and emphasizing frequent handwashing to combat the issue. “We demand that employees wear gloves, except in states where it is not allowed by health department or individual inspectors,” she says.

The chain has on all hand sinks signs in English and Spanish listing proper hand-washing procedures. Units also post “Fresh Mex Professional Hygiene Responsibilities” in English and Spanish to remind employees about the rules of no bare hand contact with food, no nail polish or false nails, and no jewelry. Many stores also set timers throughout the day, and when the timers go off, all employees wash their hands.

Chevys also mandates that each unit use an antimicrobial rinse on produce. Williamson estimates that the product can cost as much as $30 per restaurant per month.

A total of $200,000 is spent each year in supplies including the rinse, color-coded cutting boards, gloves, dissolvable labels for food items, thermometer-sanitizer stations, thermometers, portion bags and t-sticks to verify final rinse temperatures in dish machines.

Third-Party Protector
Chevys has also hired an independent auditor to make sure that its guests are safe and its staff is always vigilant in its food safety practices.

The auditor, National Everclean Services, Malibu, Calif., sends registered sanitarians into every location, corporate and franchised, once each quarter. The visits are unannounced and take place during the height of the business day. The firm’s 132 sanitarians are mostly current or retired health inspectors.

Franchisees agree up front to take part in the audits. The corporation pays only for the franchisees’ first audits, and units must get audited at their own expense until they pass. The entire audit process cost the corporation about $200,000 in 2002 alone. Williamson says the inspections often take over two hours. National Everclean checks cleanliness practices, food handling, storage and equipment.

The firm also checks bar areas, dining rooms, bathrooms and even the condition of dumpsters.

“The fact that they bring us in says a lot about the chain’s commitment,” says Jack McShane, president of National Everclean. “We provide them with a great practice run for when the health department comes.”

But the jury is out on whether chains need to spend money on third-party audits.

“We commend Chevys for putting forth the effort to look at their systems and for committing budget dollars to food safety. But we don’t endorse any particular kind of audits,” says LeAnn Chuboff, manager of science and regulatory relations for the National Restaurant Association’s Educational Foundation. She is not familiar with the services of National Everclean.

“Third-party audits can be great. But so are internal audits,” Chuboff adds.

McShane reasons that chains often need an outside perspective. He says many managers are intimidated or even scared when health inspectors come in. “We teach kitchen managers and general managers what to say and what not to say to health departments,” he explains.

National Everclean says its inspections are not only intense scrutiny of food-safety practices, but also training sessions. Any Chevys employee can talk with the hired sanitarians.

“After all, food safety is really driven by hourly employees,” says McShane. “They need to be included.”

Williamson is able to check audit results on all the units by entering a secure portion of National Everclean’s Web site.

She says, “Then I call the unit and say, ‘Well, I see you lost points for your milk temperature being off in a specific fridge. Have you made any calls yet to get the fridge checked?’”

Help from Above
Chevys takes food safety seriously from the top of the corporation down.

“The entire operations group is an extension of Valerie’s quality assurance group,” says Peter Serantoni, Chevys’ chief culinary officer. “Facilities is tied to her. Purchasing is tied to her. Quality assurance is our nerve center. And there is an extensive support system.”

Serantoni sums up his company’s philosophy as, “Food safety couldn’t be more in our face. It’s the reality of our lives.”

Adds McShane, “They have strong kitchen managers who get tremendous support from the president on through the system.”

As an example, Bill Flynn, food safety director at National Everclean, cites Chevys’ development of its own in-house cooling logs, which record temperatures of every stage of cooled, cooked and reheated foods. “Chevys took a nearly impossible path and turned the task of tracking cooled, reheated and cooked foods into second nature. It was a policy they really wanted, and they did it with some help from us.”

Flynn notes that if health departments could implement one wish regulation, mandating cooling logs would be it. “But it’s impossible for most restaurants. Legally, and in terms of follow-through, the health departments could never do it,” he says.

McShane says Chevys management realizes that attention to food safety has to take place systemwide. “If just one location has a breakdown, the press and the public won’t just look at that one location. It reflects on the whole chain.”

NRA’s Chuboff agrees. “I think customers have very high expectations for chains in particular.”

Inside Job
That fact is not lost on Williamson. Her first task upon joining Chevys in October 1999 was learning the system inside and out. Then she set to work, writing a food safety “bible” for all units to follow.

Her manual looks at food-safety procedures for every item on the menu. New managers are tested on the manual. Managers also have to sign an agreement that they will lead their employees by example and follow Chevys food-safety rules to the letter.

As added incentive, unit managers’ bonuses are tied heavily to food safety and audit results. Says Serantoni, “If you don’t pass an audit, it doesn’t matter how much money you bring in or how well your restaurant operates. You will get nothing.”

Chevys also has a goal of having all managers ServSafe certified, a goal that is about 75 percent achieved today. “Some states require that only one manager per location be certified. But we want them all to go through training,” Williamson says.

Hourly employees have their own commitments to make. They have to sign employee health reporting agreements, stating they will report any symptoms of illness to their managers. “You don’t work around here when you are sick,” says Williamson, who is in the process of rolling out formal training for hourlies.

And she reminds employees of key food-safety indicators by putting them right on every recipe. “It kind of forces them to remember every time,” Williamson explains.

Do managers, and franchisees in particular, resent such hands-on food safety practices? “Oh no. They love me,” Williamson laughs. “Really, the franchisees are very supportive. We give them the mechanism to protect their businesses.”