🍗 Wingstop Franchise Owner in California Faces $3M Tab for Allegedly Shortchanging 550 Employees
Inside the Spicy Scandal of Wage Theft in California's Fast-Food Industry
📲Moms Justice Media and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for links to products and services on this website.
Step with care and great tact, and remember that Life's a Great Balancing Act.
In a move that's spicier than their Atomic wings, California's top wage theft watchdog is giving a major franchise owner a taste of his own medicine. The California Labor Commissioner’s Office has thrown some serious shade, citing five restaurants and their owner for some not-so-delicious deeds.
Allegedly, Clinton Lewis, who might just be more interested in pinching pennies than perfecting poultry, cheated over 550 workers out of the state minimum wage, overtime, and those oh-so-crucial premiums for missed meal breaks. Lewis, the proud owner of five Kern County Wingstop franchises, now has a tab of about $3.2 million. Ouch, that's gotta hurt more than a mouthful of Mango Habanero wings.
After what we imagine was some top-tier detective work (complete with dramatic music), the investigation that began in November 2020 unveiled Lewis's sneaky strategy. From 2019 to 2022, Lewis cleverly operated each Wingstop as its own corporate entity. This wasn't just for the fun of paperwork; it made each restaurant seem like its own little kingdom, allowing King Lewis to pay his loyal subjects a lower minimum wage. But time's a-changing! As of Jan. 1, 2023, all California employers, big or small, must cough up a $15.50 minimum wage, which will jump to $16 the following year.
Now, for the juiciest bit: employees who had the "privilege" of hopping between Lewis’s restaurants in a single day were given the royal treatment of... zero overtime pay. And if they missed meal breaks? Well, let's just say Lewis wasn't too keen on compensating for that either.
Our dear friend Lewis and his empire of Wingstops received citations that read like a spicy menu:
Minimum wage violations: $190,741 (That's a lot of wings!)
Contract wages: $4,323 (Maybe enough for some fries?)
Overtime: $57,312 (Definitely enough for a soda refill)
... and the list goes on.
In total, 551 employees are waiting for their piece of the $3.2 million pie. Plus, Lewis and his chicken joints face civil penalties that could buy a whole lot of ranch dressing, totaling $1,197,900.
Labor Commissioner Lilia García-Brower, probably while resisting the urge to order some wings, commented, “This case highlights abuses in low-wage industries... Corporate schemes like these make you wonder if they're also skimping on the chicken seasoning.”
Meanwhile, in the Golden State... In a plot twist worthy of a Hollywood movie, on the same day this news broke, Gov. Gavin Newsom, perhaps inspired by the Wingstop saga, signed a law boosting the fast-food minimum wage in California to $20 an hour from next April. This law, previously known as the not-so-catchy Assembly Bill 1228, is a handshake between union-backed fast-food workers and the restaurant bigwigs. Initially, workers aimed for a bill making big corporations, like Wingstop, accountable for franchisee violations. But in a dramatic turn of events, the restaurant industry agreed to the $20 minimum wage. Maybe they just wanted to avoid another Wingstop-style scandal?
