Should You Ban Kids From Your Restaurant?

(This post originally appeared on Inc.)

Is it discrimination? Or just a savvy business move?

A restaurant owner decided recently to ban children under the age of 14 from his establishment after 5PM – and his decision appears to be a profitable one.

“Guests complained that they wanted to have a nice evening, with dinner and a bottle of wine, and time and time again children ruined that,” Rudolf Markl, the owner of Oma’s Küche, which is located on the island of Rügen on Germany’s Baltic Sea coast, told Quartz. “They throw food around, play tag, shout loudly around the place, climb under the tables–and other guests have no patience with it anymore.”

The restaurant owner had been putting up with these childish antics – like pulling tablecloths and “throwing around wine glasses” (good Lord!) for almost eleven years, according to a report from the news service DW.com. He eventually hit a breaking point when a few unruly children damaged inventory and items that included a few antique photo stands.

Does any of this surprise a parent? Of course not. In fact, it sounds kind of tame compared to a typical family dinner in my house. But I get it. Sometimes you just want a quiet meal without kids – and there are no grandparents, handcuffs or cattle prods handy to help.

Which is why the backlash against children in restaurants is not a new one. Food and Wine reports that two restaurants – a Tampa Bay craft beer bar and pizzeria and an upscale Mooresville, N.C. eatery both instituted a “no kids” policy last year and over the past few years other bars and restaurants around the world have also banned children, sometimes just around dinner time and sometimes permanently. In societies like ours where we have bent over backwards to accommodate and coddle our children, it appears that an anti-kid movement is taking hold, at least around meal time. So is this such a bad thing?

The reaction among customers has been mixed. Some have gone so far as to boycott restaurants that implement a “no kids” policy while others have taken out their frustrations on social media review sites like Yelp and Facebook. Others, however, are more sympathetic. Markl says he has received more than 1,200 emails of support in the past few weeks with some telling him his actions are “long overdue” and that business has been “booming” since the decision.

“It has nothing at all to do with discrimination,” Markl told DW.com. “It is a restaurant and not a playground.”

In the end, and as the parent of three, I get it. Going out to eat with young children can not only be stressful for the other diners, but sometimes taxing on parents as well. It’s hard to enjoy a steak while also keep an eye out for flying wine glasses. And besides, I always preferred to go to family-oriented restaurants where both the staff and my fellow customers were more understanding because they also have their own misbehaving kids and we could all just sigh and eat together in shared misery. For some parents, going out to dinner is all about getting away from the kids – all kids – and trying to relax and be just a little grown-up for a few hours.

There’s plenty of room in the food industry for restaurants that ban children and eateries like Markl’s just add more eating out options. If you’re a customer and so upset that a restaurant bans children then go somewhere else. It’s not like there isn’t competition. If you’re a restaurant owner and want to follow in Markl’s footsteps, just know that there will be some who disagree and brace yourself for a little backlash. But in the end, like Markl, you might also see an uptick in your business. In any case, there’s no reason for everyone to act so…well…childish.