I haven't played business lots too much, but whenever I do, my sim's employees never have the brains to make something to eat from the fridge while they're on break. Is it meant to be this way? I know they're hungry, because their little orb is off colour and when I serve a meal, they eventually, sometimes, eat that, but more often than not, even that just ends up spoiling.

Do you really have to babysit them like this or am I missing something? It's annoying because I risk losing employees - they quit because they didn't choose to eat on their break. They look after themselves in every other aspect just fine, but not hunger.

Employees are a pain, IMO. Which is why I don't use them anymore. But when I did...Well, the problem is that they arrive with pretty low motives, which is just stupid, and they can't fill them all on a break. So, what I used to do is to just max their motives (using a modded object that had an individual motive-adjusting feature) when they arrived for work and then didn't bother with breaks or a break room. They'd be fine until the business closed for the day. Because otherwise, yeah you kind of do have to babysit them because they do suck at feeding themselves, especially.

I imagine there are probably mods you can use (I know Pescado has "Business Runs You," and I'd bet there's something in that that makes employees work better), but I just opted to get rid of employees entirely and either use family members as business laborers or stick with small businesses that a single Sim can run by themselves.

I currently use this mod that iCad mentioned, as I got sick of babysitting my employees as well. I just want to enjoy running a business. As you see from the thread, it also comes with a lot of other handy features.

http://www.insimenator.org/showthread.php?t=7009

I myself only use the refreshment cheats though.

Awesome, this mod looks ideal. I was expecting to, at best, have to manually refresh their hunger. Thank you both.

Not really an answer to your question of how to make the employees eat, but I use snapdragon bouquets to help with their motives.

You can also use snap dragons and they will take care of all their needs except for energy. On lots that don't have those I simply make them selectable and tell them to eat or do whatever it is that they need. Another option would be using the simblender.

Paladin has a sort of food-machine. It's a big box-like thing, where Sims pick a dish, and it generates it for them. I have it in most of my break rooms, and my employees have no problems using it when they are hungry.

http://simwardrobe.com/ -> Sims 2 -> Objects -> Food replicators

Sim wardrobe/Paladin also has the buffets which can be set to pay. Those look nicer then the food machine. Lot's of options for keeping them fed.