Broder's Peter Bro Launches Industry Alternative to Craigslist

As if Broder's Peter Bro — who also founded Savoy, Aalto Lounge, and Bar Bar — didn't have enough on his plate, a new business venture is set to further familiarize him to the restaurant industry: Poachedjobs.com, a job posting/seeking site meant as an industry alternative to Craigslist. "Right now, we are still in launch phase, and we have more features to roll out over the next few months, but essentially Poached will help people who are looking for jobs find a compatible workplace through a more targeted approach to hiring," Bro says. "For those folks who aren't actively looking for a new position, they can follow Poached to keep with industry trends and happenings."

And Bro's taking his idea national, with hopes to launch Poached in Seattle, Austin, and other cities nationwide. Eater sat down with Bro to learn more about the project.

What was the inspiration for starting Poached?
Poached was borne out the frustration I experienced posting jobs on Craigslist. First of all, the broad focus of CL gives it a sort of clearinghouse mentality. A posting may get hundreds of resumes in response, but only a few represent truly qualified applicants. [...] Ultimately we expect Poached to provide both sides, employers and job seekers, a network through which they can uniquely market their expectations and qualifications. We hope the connections made through Poached lead to employees who are more satisfied with their workplace and stay in their positions for a longer period of time. I have always been a connector of people, be it friends to contractors, businesses to brokers, and workers to workplaces... the idea for Poached seemed a natural fit as I began to think of the next job to put on my resume.

What is the reaction in the restaurant community? And the community at large?
The reaction has been positive, really positive, which can be kind of falsely assuring. I see the enthusiastic response as clear proof there is a need for a functional alternative to CL. We are still in the Beta phase and have many more features in the works to upgrade the usability and overall experience. The site has been up for less than a month, and in order for it to truly be useful to the service industry as a whole, we need the people who are looking for jobs to use the site and then give us feedback on what needs to be added and improved. I am confident that once both sides recognize the site as the new alternative to filling and finding a job fast, Poached will see some true successes.

Do you hope to take Poached nation-wide like Craigslist?
Simple answer, yes. In order for Poached to make financial sense we have to have a presence in other cities. Plus the prospect of getting to know the food scenes and culture of other cities will be more fun... more work, but more fun. Plans are to enter Seattle very soon because we know it well and have a great respect for the food scene there. After that we plan to head over to Austin just because we love Austin, and know we'll need the sun!
· Poached Jobs [Official site]