Dentons Digest
On April 9, 2024, in Adames v. Ruth’s Hospitality Group, Inc., No. 1:22-CV-00036 (N.D. Oh.), Judge Charles E. Fleming of the Northern District of Ohio, denied Plaintiff’s Motion for Conditional Certification and Court-Supervised Notice to Potential Opt-in Plaintiffs. In Adames, the employee alleged that the restaurant group paid its servers and runners less than minimum wage for non-tipped “side work” tasks that they performed more than 20% of the time. Judge Fleming applied the Sixth Circuit’s “strong likelihood” standard in Clark and denied Adames’ request to send court-approved notice to all former/current runners and servers who worked at the restaurant group’s three locations in Ohio. Companies facing collective actions in Ohio, Michigan, Tennessee, and Kentucky should read this opinion and keep it in their back pocket for potential, successful arguments to assert against a motion for conditional certification and approved-notice.
Case Background
Ruth’s Hospitality Group, Inc. employed Armani Adames at its Cleveland, Ohio restaurant location. Adames alleges that the restaurant group violated the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) by having a policy that paid him and other employees less than minimum wage when they were performing non-tipped “side work” tasks – including cleaning tables, chairs, and booths – more than 20% of the time. Id. at 1-2. Adames asserts that this policy applied to servers and runners at the restaurant group’s Cleveland, Columbus, and Cincinnati locations. Id. at 2. Adames filed a Motion for Conditional Certification and Court-Supervised Notice to Potential Opt-in Plaintiffs (“Motion for Conditional Certification”) and requested that the court grant court-approved notice to “[a]ll former and current runners and servers employed by Defendant Ruth’s Hospitality Group, Inc. at its Ohio locations at any time during the three-year period prior to the filing of this action to the present.” Id. at 3. In support of his motion, Adames submitted declarations and affidavits for two other employees who worked at the Cleveland and Columbus locations. Id. at 4. In May 2023, the district court stayed the case, pending the Sixth Circuit’s decision in Clark v. A&L Homecare and Training Center, LLC. Id. at 3-4.
On May 19, 2023, the Sixth Circuit issued its pivotal decision in Clark v. A&L Homecare and Training Center, LLC, 68 F.4th 1003 (6th Cir. 2023). The Sixth Circuit rejected the “lenient” or “modest factual showing” standard that had previously been required to prompt court-approved notice to members of a proposed collective. Instead, the Court adopted a stricter standard, requiring FLSA plaintiffs to establish a “strong likelihood” that the plaintiff is similarly situated to potential opt-ins.
After the Sixth Circuit issued its decision in Clark, the parties submitted supplemental briefing in support of his Motion for Conditional Certification.
District Court Holding
The district court, applying the Sixth Circuit’s stricter standard in Clark, denied Plaintiff’s Motion for Conditional Certification and Court-Supervised Notice to Potential Opt-in Plaintiffs and found that Adames failed to produce any evidence that the runners and servers who worked at the Cincinnati and Columbus locations were similarly situated to the runners and servers at the Cleveland location. Id. at 17.
With regard to the Cincinnati location, the court found that Adames failed to produce evidence that the Cincinnati location had a FLSA-violating policy and failed to produce any personal knowledge from himself or through affidavits of other employees about the Cincinnati location. Id. at 10-11. The court explained that the only evidence about the Cincinnati location’s policies were the job descriptions, but those job descriptions stated that side work varied by restaurant and instructed employees to see the manager for side work responsibilities relating to the positions. Id. at 10-11.
With regard to the Columbus location, the court found that the one potential opt-in was not similarly situated to Adames because (1) she had only worked there between September 2019 and January 2020, which was only a small fraction of the period covered in Adames’ proposed collective and (2) she did not have any personal knowledge of the location’s policies or procedures after January 2020. Id. at 13-14. In addition, the court found that because the potential opt-in was subject to different FLSA regulations regarding tipped work during the time she was employed, she could not be similarly situated because both employees would be subject to different defenses. Id. at 14.
Lastly, with regard to the Cleveland location, the court found that Adames failed to meet the new, stricter standard in Clark because: (1) he only attached one affidavit from a potential opt-in that was identical in substance to his own affidavit and provided no new, relevant factual matter for the Court to consider; and (2) the potential opt-in’s affidavit actually showed several differences between runners and servers. Id. at 16. The court explained that these differences rendered the two employees dissimilarly situated. Id.
Key Takeaways for Companies
Adames v. Ruth’s Hospitality Group, Inc. is one of the first decisions issued out of the Northern District of Ohio applying the stricter “strong likelihood” standard and denying a plaintiff’s motion for conditional certification and court-approved notice on the first go-around. The district court’s analysis in Adames illustrates that plaintiffs must present more than one cookie-cutter affidavit to show that they are similarly situated to other employees in the same and/or different locations.
