If I go to Chile’s and they tell me there’s a 45-minute wait, I won’t be upset if I choose to wait. But if they say they’ll get to me as soon as they can, that could set the expectation to just be a few minutes.

Word of mouth is great at saying how good the food is, but it often doesn’t mention to expect a longer wait time.

Maybe your friend does this. But maybe a simple sign that says “Thank you for eating with us! Due to high demand, the wait time is expected to be 45 minutes.”

If there’s a strong trend on when it gets busy and when the crowding dies off, your friend could even suggest coming back at a different time when the wait time would be 15 minutes or less.

Also, if he’s got a huge facility that looks like it’s being underutilized, the perception could be that he is purposefully not hiring enough help or serving people when he might have the capacity to do so. But if it’s a tiny hole in the wall and every table is always packed and employees are scrambling around, most people will recognize what’s happening.

A lot of it is expectations and perception.