PHOTO: Hooters was founded in 1983.
It’s not just a place for a girl to flaunt her assets — it’s also a place for her to launch a career.
Hooters — the famed breastaurant chain started in Clearwater, Fla. 40 years ago — has mounted a nationwide campaign to showcase Hooters Girls who went on from slinging wings and beer to become successful businesswomen.
The company sent a survey called “The Search for I AM a Hooters Girl Success Stories – Past & Present,” to many of the 400,000 waitresses and bartenders who have squeezed themselves into the cleavage-baring tank tops and orange-colored bun-huggers since 1983.
Heading the initiative is Cheryl Whiting-Kish, a former Hooters Girl who wants to highlight those who ‘successfully leveraged their time in the orange shorts to prepare for life beyond the orange shorts.”
“What I am purposely doing is using language around the women of Hooters, the powerful women of Hooters and how we are celebrating, elevating, empowering and educating them,” Whiting-Kish told Nations Restaurant News last month.
She declined to speak with The Post and a spokesperson for the company declined to comment on the initiative.
Among the Hooters Girls making a splash in business are Aliscia Andrews, currently Virginia’s deputy secretary for cybersecurity, and Taddy Beuke, who traded in her skimpy uniform to find success as a real estate executive with Fasken Oil and Ranch in San Antonio, Tex.
“You can’t pigeonhole us just because we worked at Hooters,” Beuke told The Post. “If you work at Hooters you are typically around a group of men and it taught me how to be one of the guys, being able to hold my own in the construction industry.”
Beuke wrote on LinkedIn that she “went from wearing orange shorts in my early 20s to an orange vest and hardhat in my 30s and I wouldn’t change a thing.”
The company, with its wide-eyed owl logo, had more than 400 locations nationwide a decade ago but has seen the number of franchises tumble to around 300.
The falloff has been partly blamed on the brand’s overt sexuality, which is seemingly a turn-off to the socially-conscious younger generation of diners. A series of articles several years ago famously boasted headlines like “Hooters are closing because Millennials don’t like boobs.”
It has also faced allegations of sexism from community activists who tried to stop Hooters from opening in certain locations – including in Brooklyn, NY – and lawsuits alleging sex discrimination and unfair labor practices. Last year, the chain came under fire for not hiring curvier servers.
And the chain sparked a social media storm last October when it redesigned the orange shorts into wedgie-causing thongs — only scrapping the new look after waitresses complained.
Whiting-Kish, who was appointed the company’s Chief People Person last month, hopes the new campaign will take the focus off the tight-fitting uniforms and shine the spotlight on the women wearing them.
“I think it’s time to honor who she is as an individual versus a stereotype that some might have around the orange shorts,” Whiting-Kish told restaurant trade publication FSR. “I think that is judgment and ridiculous because when you begin to look at these women as human beings, you go wait a minute, how can you argue with the fact that she’s in law school, she’s now a doctor or she’s a mother raising a beautiful family. … I think that’s where our opportunity is.”
READ MORE VIA NYPOST
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