Twin Peaks Brentwood workers return after strike wins reinstatement, $200,000 settlement

Former Twin Peaks Brentwood workers returned to the restaurant after a strike fight that ended with reinstatement and $200,000 in compensation, a result that goes far beyond a routine settlement. For restaurant operators, the message is blunt: a dispute over retaliation, wages, and working conditions can end with workers back in place and the employer paying to unwind the damage.

The conflict began with a one-month strike in January 2023, when 18 kitchen workers walked out on Saturday, Jan. 14. By the following Monday, the action had spread to 10 servers, bringing 21 kitchen workers and 10 servers onto the picket line. Workers accused general manager Andrew “Hunter” Kirkpatrick of throwing away lunches, berating employees for speaking Spanish, and threatening to call the police. They also said management was stealing tips and failing to pay overtime.

The demands quickly reflected the realities of restaurant work. Workers called for an end to tip theft, payment of unpaid overtime, safety training for servers dealing with aggressive customers, a security guard to escort waitstaff to their cars, and reinstatement of a coworker they said had been unjustly fired. That mix of issues made the dispute more than a pay fight. It became a test of whether line cooks and servers, who often get divided by shifts, language, and front-of-house versus back-of-house status, could hold together against management pressure.

That solidarity mattered. Labor Notes described the strike as a rare example of cross-race, cross-ethnicity, and cross-job organizing, with Indigenous kitchen workers from Mexico and Guatemala joining a racially diverse group of women servers. Workers’ Dignity also described the Brentwood workplace as highly objectifying, with pressure on servers tied to Twin Peaks’ Hooters-like presentation. Twin Peaks, founded in Dallas in 2005, had about 100 locations in the United States and Mexico at the time of the strike, which meant the dispute carried lessons far beyond one Brentwood dining room.

The legal trail ran through the National Labor Relations Board, where the case against CNG Restaurants LLC, doing business as Twin Peaks, and successor TP Midtown, LLC, doing business as Twin Peaks, was filed in Region 10 in Atlanta on April 13, 2023. The board docket shows a complaint and notice of hearing on Dec. 12, 2025, and a signed conformed settlement agreement on March 27, 2026. The NLRB says more than 90% of meritorious unfair labor practice cases are settled by agreement at some point, and this case shows why employers fight that process carefully: retaliation and discharge allegations can turn into reinstatement orders, cash payouts, and public proof that workers who organize may win their jobs back.

The first reinstatement group, 15 workers, returned on April 24. A second group came back on April 27. For restaurant workers watching a tough industry where turnover is high and retaliation fears are real, the outcome landed as a concrete reminder that collective action can still move a labor case from the picket line back onto the clock.