Intern, Hospitality Operations & Growth

Faherty Brand•Spring Lake, NJ

5d•Onsite

About The Position

Sun and Waves isn't just a restaurant, it's become a heartbeat of Spring Lake summers. Every plate and drink that goes out is a chance to create a memory for someone's best day of the year. We take that seriously, and we have a lot of fun doing it. We're looking for a sharp, hungry, and genuinely curious Operations & Growth Intern to join our leadership team this summer. This isn't a "shadow and fetch coffee" kind of role. You'll be embedded in the business from day one, working shoulder-to-shoulder with ownership and our General Manager to sharpen our financial controls, tighten our systems, and push our guest experience to a whole new level. If you love the energy of a busy restaurant, get excited about data and process, and want real-world business experience that actually means something — this summer has your name on it.

Requirements

Currently pursuing or recently completed a degree in Business, Hospitality, Finance, or a related field
You've worked in a restaurant or food service environment — you know the pace and you love it
You're comfortable with data: spreadsheets don't intimidate you, and you know how to tell a story with numbers
You communicate clearly and confidently with a team — from the dishwasher to the owner
You're an operator at heart: you see something inefficient and your first instinct is to fix it
You have experience with — or are a fast learner of — POS systems (Toast experience is a serious bonus)
You show up sharp, stay humble, and thrive when things get fast and chaotic (peak Saturday lunch, anyone?)
You take ownership of your work and follow through without being chased down

Nice To Haves

Toast experience is a serious bonus

Responsibilities

Build and maintain daily, weekly, and seasonal sales reporting dashboards
Identify revenue trends, slow movers, and missed opportunities in our menu mix
Help create P&L-level visibility so ownership can make fast, informed decisions
Track labor costs against sales by daypart and flag when we drift out of range
Support end-of-week financial reconciliation alongside our GM
Establish and run weekly inventory counts across food, beverage, and supplies
Track usage vs. theoretical to surface waste, over-portioning, and shrink
Work with the kitchen to build out and standardize recipe costing on Toast
Help set and monitor ideal food and beverage cost targets by category
Create a purchasing rhythm and par system that keeps us stocked without over-buying
Audit how our team currently uses Toast and identify gaps and workarounds
Optimize our menu architecture — item builds, modifiers, combos — for speed and accuracy
Build out reporting templates so our leadership team has actionable data daily
Train front-of-house on best practices: table management, check flow, tip reporting
Work with ownership to explore and implement Toast features we aren't using yet
Observe and map our current order flow from ticket to table — find where time is lost
Partner with the kitchen on ticket timing, expo communication, and rush prep
Work with FOH leadership on table turn strategy during peak summer hours
Help design and maintain a service standards checklist the whole team buys into
Gather and analyze guest feedback and turn it into concrete action items