Dining out on Valentine’s Day is overrated.

This isn’t an anti-love or anti-establishment sentiment forged from bitterness and a need to buck tradition. It’s just a fact.

If you think about it, going to a restaurant for Valentine’s Day sucks for everyone. Whoever is tasked with planning the date is under enormous pressure to select the right restaurant and call far enough in advance to get a decent reservation. The person who is being treated to dinner is stressed about what the heck they’re going to wear, how to keep the conversation going over several hours, and how not to get upset when something goes wrong. And something will inevitably go wrong.

Then there’s the hospitality side of it all. A whole team of servers, chefs and bartenders are called on to make sure all is well in the land of love—for you and hundreds of other diners.

The earliest Valentine’s Day reservations usually start trickling in around Christmas. These come from relationship veterans who've been in the game long enough to know how to avoid ire from their partner. Reservation momentum gathers throughout January and early February, and by the week of the big day, phones begin ringing nonstop, with desperate hopefuls on the other end of the line begging to be squeezed in. You could probably seat those people in the mop closet and they'd be relieved just to have snagged a reservation.

One local server, who's been in the hospitality biz for 25 years but asked to remain anonymous, recalls a previous year's staff meeting ahead of the holiday. Her manager began the meeting with, “Here we are, hell week!” 

“I think that covers it,” the server says. “It’s also not even just Valentine's Day anymore. It really is the entire week.”

This server has worked in every type of restaurant, from a fast-casual joint when she was 15 years old to fine-dining restaurants in New York City and now a premium waterfront spot in Sarasota. She prides herself on being someone who provides exceptional service and makes great effort to show grace and kindness. But during Valentine’s week, she says, that's impossible.

“There’s a wide range of couples who are in awkward stages," she says. "There are the couples who can’t stand each other but feel the obligation to keep trying; new couples who don’t want to overeat or overspend; and couples who rarely dine out, making them difficult to connect with and guide through the busy evening.”

And it is a busy evening. Because the night is all about two-top tables, restaurants employ myriad solutions to maximize profits. Higher-end spots put together a limited prix fixe menu to ease the stress on the kitchen, but will also usually mark those items up because guests will spend if they have to. That means right out of the gate, the chef might feel uninspired and the diner might feel like he's getting ripped off. It’s a lose-lose.

Some restaurants go so far as to rent small tables from caterers, rolling out their large six-person circular tables and replacing them with four small tables in pockets throughout the restaurant. I know this because I’ve worked at two swanky spots that did it. Rearranging furniture the night before Valentine’s Day is a special brand of hell. It may seem like an ingenious way to adapt, but most places awkwardly cram in far too many tables, which cause servers to trip and leaves diners sitting practically on top of other couples.

On top of it all, Valentine's Day isn't even a giant money maker for restaurants, which often overstaff the evening to err on the side of caution. That's OK: the restaurant business isn’t 100 percent money 100 percent of the time. But when you bend over backward to make an evening special, it’s nice to know you’ll be rewarded in the end. On Valentine’s Day, that just ain’t gonna happen.

Our anonymous server acknowledges that Valentine’s Day is just a blip, and unlike the rest of the year in any way. Still, she's sad that diners that day are less interested in a spectacular hospitality experience and instead seem to be there to “get [the holiday] over with.”

“Let’s be honest,” she says. “The real couples, the ones in healthy relationships, know to stay home that night.”