Customers dining at Spotted Fox Ale House in St. Charles Thursday night might have been taken aback to hear one of the restaurant’s waitresses suddenly start screaming.

That was Natalie Pacheco’s reaction when she found out that one of her customers had given her a $500 tip.

“When I was trying to type it into the computer, I saw the amount,” said the 18-year-old St. Charles North High School graduate. “I didn’t fully process it until I had to type in every single number there was. I went to my boyfriend and said, ‘Look at this.’ And then I started screaming with joy. The owner was there as well and he asked what was going on. And I showed him as well and he was happy.”

Pacheco is a freshman at Chicago State University, where she is a nursing major. She is a member of the women’s soccer team at the university and recently started renting an apartment in Chicago with a few of her teammates.

She has only been working at the restaurant for a couple of months. Pacheco usually only works on the weekends, but took an extra shift on Thursday because some of her fellow workers were taking a holiday break.

Suffice to say, Pacheco is happy she decided to work that day. She has no immediate plans for the money.

“I’m going to put it in my savings right now,” she said.

Pacheco juggles two jobs. Along with being a waitress at Spotted Fox, she also works for her parents and does the paperwork for their construction company.

This is Pacheco’s first waitress job.

“We hired her on the fly based on her attitude and personality,” Spotted Fox owner Marwan Taib said. “We trained her and people love Natalie.”

Employees at Spotted Fox are trained to connect with their customers.

“I always preach that,” Taib said. ‘We have to make them feel like they’re at home. And Natalie just grasped that so fast. We used the tip as an example to encourage other staff that if they treat their customers well, they will come back and take care of you.”

He said the tip also shows how generous the surrounding community has been to the restaurant as it attempts to bounce back following the challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“In St. Charles, we have bounced back a lot stronger because of the support of the local community,” he said. “We sold so many gift cards to people just trying to help us out.”

Treating people with kindness is in Pacheco’s nature.

“That’s how my parents raised me,” she said. “I give my customers good energy. I’m a really happy person. I feel that if I’m happy, then somehow, I will make them happy.”

John Hoffman, owner of Whyrent Real Estate Co. in Batavia, appreciated the attitude that Pacheco displayed when she was waiting on his table Thursday. Along with the tip, he wrote a note on the receipt telling her to keep up her great attitude and to buy herself something for Christmas.

“I liked her go get ‘em attitude,” he said. “I really felt that this was a person that could use a good break.”