🪧 Growing picket lines

Welcome to Wednesday.

• 🎶 Sounds like: "Boulevard of Broken Dreams," which is 20 years old.

Today's weather: Sunny with temps in the mid-50s.

Situational awareness: U.S. Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough will visit the Jamaica Plain VA Medical Center today.

Today's newsletter is 796 words — a 3-minute read.

Nearly 700 hotel workers joined a strike against some of the biggest names in Boston hospitality. 

The big picture: Thousands of hotel workers were already on strike at Hilton, Hyatt and Marriott hotels in Hawaii, San Francisco, Seattle and Boston.

• Their numbers grow as the employers and the unions fail to reach contract agreements.

Catch up quick: Nearly 600 workers at the Hilton Boston Park Plaza in the Back Bay and the Hilton Boston Logan Airport walked off the job earlier this month, per the Boston Business Journal.

• They vowed to strike until Hilton leaders and their union, UNITE HERE Local 26, reach a deal that includes higher pay, pension increases and better benefits.

The latest: 685 workers from the Omni Parker House and the Omni Boston Seaport hotels voted to go on strike, per UNITE HERE Local 26.

• They include room attendants, front desk agents, cooks, dishwashers, banquet staff, bellhops and others.

What they're saying: "I work two jobs in order to provide for my family. I'm always rushing, and I don't even have time to see my kids," Yuri Yep, a restaurant server at the Omni Parker House, said in a statement. 

• "[The hotels] can afford what we're asking for, and we'll be out on strike until we win for all our families."

The other side: Michelle Myers, a Hilton spokesperson, said Hilton and the union are negotiating, but that workers have some of the "highest-paying jobs in the hospitality industry" in the Boston area.

• "While we disagree with many of the union's current demands, we trust that we share the same goal which is to negotiate toward a fair and reasonable agreement that is beneficial to both our valued team members and our hotels," Myers said.
• Omni representatives did not respond to a request for comment. 

Between the lines: The union has been in talks with the hotels since April over new contracts with wage increases and "sustainable workloads," per a press release. 

• Union leaders say the workers' key demands remain unmet and the raises the hotels want to offer "do not reflect their record profits and are not enough to offset cost-of-living increases."

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One way to keep workers happy as they return to the office? Free snacks.

Why it matters: Boston is notorious for its high cost of living, and new data from ezCater suggests free food is a draw for employees.

Driving the news: In Boston, 20% of workers surveyed enjoy free snacks in the office, more than any other metro surveyed in ezCater's lunch survey released today.

• 17% of workers nationwide enjoy free snacks in the office. 
• 58% of all hybrid workers surveyed said they would commit to three days in the office if it came with a free lunch.

Zoom out: More employees are skipping lunch because of full calendars, limited time to make deadlines and other factors, ezCater's research suggests. 

• Workers are also eating out less and spending less when they order lunch due to rising costs.
• Millennials and Gen Z workers in particular are instead taking mid-afternoon breaks to eat treats, especially if they're free.

 💭 Steph's thought bubble: Count me in on the mid-afternoon treats. They're cheaper and sometimes just more convenient than a full-fledged lunch break. 

Tell your work friends

⚽️ Boston's new National Women's Soccer League franchise was named the BOS Nation Football Club. (NBC Boston)

• The team is scheduled to start playing in 2026 at White Stadium, despite opposition from some residents.

❌ Thornton's Fenway Grille closed its doors after more than three decades in business. (Restaurant Talk)

Kith and Kin, a Hudson restaurant that served a group of World War II reenactors, apologized for not asking the reenactors wearing SS uniforms to change before seating them. (NBC Boston)

• The restaurant has received threats since word spread about the incident.

🏈 Patriots Hall of Famer Tom Brady is now a minority owner of the Las Vegas Raiders, holding a 10% stake between him and his business partner. (NFL.com)

❌ Zapata Computing, a Boston-based quantum computing startup that spun out of Harvard, is going out of business six months after getting listed on the stock market. (Globe)

When customers started asking for dipping sauce for their dumplings, Dumpling Daughter founder Nadia Liu Spellman listened. She now sells a line of sauces across the globe.

Here's how: "Fulfillment by Amazon makes packaging and shipping so easy, anyone can do it," says Spellman.

Learn more.

Steph here. Soup season is upon us, which means the lines at Ganko Ramen in Brookline are only going to get longer.

• But it's still worth the wait.

The intrigue: It's a go-to ramen shop inside the Arcade Building in Coolidge Corner.

What I got: The shoyu ramen with pork, mushrooms, seaweed, scallions and, of course, noodles and a dark broth. Plus some ginger ale.

Price: $19, not including tax and tip.

Yesterday we asked where our mascot Townie had flapped off to.

She was perched atop one of the lights inside the Berkeley Building, aka the old John Hancock tower.

Nobody got it right. Do better!

Max launched his sports mugs with Amazon in 2016. This holiday season, MAX'IS Creations is projecting to go from selling 100 mugs a day to 2,500 mugs per day.

• "Without our Amazon store, there's no way we could have built this into the million-dollar business it is today," said Max Ash.

Learn more.

Deehan is out this week.

Steph could really go for a sopa wantan right about now.

This newsletter was edited by Jeff Weiner.