Mollie Ableman | Senior Thesis 1 | Paul Carlos | Fall 2011 | PUCD 4205 F | CRN: 5339

RIGHTS

REVEALED

PROPOSAL

WHAT?

HOW?

New York city’s restaurant industry is an extremely important contributor to the city’s economy. It is responsible for employing nearly 700,000 people. (National Restaurant Association). Yet many workers are consistently mistreated due to being underpaid, and overworked. The purpose of my project is to combat and raise awareness about this issue. I will use my design skills to create printed and (or) digital materials that assist in the fight for fair labor laws to be recognized.

One piece that would speak directly to the workers would be a wallet sized fold out pamphlet. It will clearly lay out the information that is most crucial for a New York city restaurant employee to know, such as minimum wage, over time wages, and allowed paid breaks they are entitled to. I hope to have it translated into an array of the most commonly spoken languages such as Spanish, Chinese, Russian, Korean, and French. This would ensure that it will be helpful to a diverse range of workers. Another design I would like to implement is a symbol/emblem that could be used in a variety of ways to illustrate that a restaurant practices fair labor. This would be similar to the health grades the city uses to rate health standards. Similar to the health grade the symbol could be displayed in the window of restaurants,

other implementations could be placing the symbol on restaurant rating websites such as the new York times, new York magazine, yelp, and urban spoon. Just as when a restaurant lists its features such as delivery or cash only, fair labor too would be listed and expressed by use of this symbol. A third idea would be to create an interactive map, and or App, that listed all the fair labor restaurants as well as those that have violated them. This would allow users to make educated decisions about what type of establishment they want to give their business to.

WHY?

WHO?

This project is needed in order to help inform workers of their rights. A large part of the problem is that many restaurant employees are unaware of their rights. Once they are armed with the necessary knowledge, they will be able to ask for their rights to be recognized with the confidence of having the law as a foundation to their argument. Another reason this issue perpetuates is that the public, specifically those who are frequent diners, are unaware of the issues that exist. By informing the public of poor restaurant practices I hope to ignite awareness within them about their dining choices. I hope people will start to make choices based not just on the quality of food but also that workers are treated in accordance to fair labor laws.

This project will be useful to the thousands of people who eat out in New York City and those self-proclaimed “foodies” who care about the fair development of the New York City restaurant industry. It will also speak to the 700,000 restaurant employees both past and present who want their rights to be recognized and acknowledged.

Restaurant Opportunities Center of New York is a nonprofit organization fighting to better working conditions for restaurant employees. I met with them on October 5th to better understand the issues at hand. They have some handouts for workers and the public but their distribution is limited and material is not up to date or translated into different languages. The ideas for outreach are good yet unsuccessful due to the weak execution.

RESEARCH

Restaurant workers rights handout by ROC NY.

Phamphlet of “High Road” (fair labor) restaurants by ROC NY.

desigNYC is an organization that connects designers with nonprofits to create a greater social impact. I have been looking into their projects in order to understand how to approach designing for social causes.

Jessica Weber Design is another studio that has worked with numerous non-profit clients. Researching their past projects has been a helpful way to better understand the needs and limitations of design of this kind.

Good/Corps is another company that focuses its ef-forts on social impact. I plan on further researching desigNYC, Jessica Weber Design, and Good/Corps inquiring about being able to interview them about their design process and about the challenges that designing for non- profits and social change present.

IDEATION

Printing facts about the mistreatment of restaurant workers onto restaurant materials such as napkins and chopstick sleeves is a potential way to educate the public.

Using graphs made of restaurant materials such as forks and knifes, or food and ingredients could be an effective way to communicate facts and statistics.

Another area of intrest is restuarant signage from the kitchen that speaks directly to employees.

Using classic restaurant iconography as an aesthetic guide will help marry my concept and message together.

I plan on looking into all the various impactful moments of American Labor Movements. Above is an image featuring Cesar Chavez who was a civil rights activist who faught for farmers labor rights.

“How The Other Half Lives” by Jacob Riis may be a good point of refrence if I choose to incorporate a photographic element into my project.

Another possible asthetic direction is usiging design elements found in past labor movements. The above image is from the great depression.