Weight Discrimination Suit at Hooters Proceeds

Wall Street Journal

By Dionne Searcey
August 25, 2010

Hooters remains potentially on the hook for alleged weight discrimination.

A Michigan judge today ruled that two former waitresses who filed a weight discrimination case against the restaurant chain could proceed with their cases.

Hooters had said the defendants signed agreements to arbitrate any discrimination claims rather than take them to court. The company has said it does not impose weight requirements on employees.

According to this story from the Lasing State Journal, Macomb County Circuit Judge Peter Maceroni said the women “may not have knowingly waived their right to litigate their claims in court should their claim be proven that they were never afforded an opportunity to take the agreement with them to consult with counsel.”

Cassandra Marie Smith, one of the plaintiffs, alleges in her complaint that she began working at a Hooters in 2008. At the time, she weighed 145 pounds.

In a performance evaluation this earlier year, she claims in her complaint, a restaurant manager advised her “to join a gym in order to lose weight and improve her looks so that she would fit better into the extra small-sized uniform.” She alleged she was put on 30-day “weight probation” and resigned.

The official uniform for Hooters waitresses, she claims, comes in 3 sizes: extra extra small, extra small, or small.

According to this story from the Grand Rapids Press, the suit cites Michigan’s Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination by employers based on a number of factors. Height and weight discrimination were added in a 1976 amendment by then-state Rep. Thomas Mathieu.

Mathieu originally introduced the height and weight amendment because he was “flabbergasted” by the number of cases of unfairness involving women seeking office jobs who possessed the necessary skills and personality, but were overweight.

“They wanted Raquel Welch at the front desk,” Mathieu told the Grand Rapids Press.

Attorney Richard Bernstein, counsel to Smith, called the suit a “benchmark case” that will establish the proposition that physical appearance should not be a component of an employee keeping his or her job, according to the Grand Rapids Press.