By Chris ParryAtlantic Publishing
Part 1 of 3: Establishing House Drink Recipes
A bartender makes a good drink with originality, panache, speed and skill - but a great drink starts with the boss. You determine the drink menu, you determine the recipes to be used and you set the price and make the rules. Your staff just follows your lead. In many bars, it's left to individual members of staff to know the "standard" formulas for cocktails and mixed drinks. Everyone is supposed to know that a Tequila Sunrise has one shot of tequila, right? Or is it two? Maybe it's a shot and a half... Profits are too hard won to just throw away alcohol when your staff crosses their wires about your drink recipes. Some easy steps to ensuring standardization of your house recipes include:
- Recipe lists. Make sure when you take on new staff they receive detailed recipe lists to take home and look over before they start their first shift. It doesn't cost you a lot to photocopy a few pages of text and give them to your staff, so make sure there's no excuse for them not to know as much as they can before they start mixing on your dime.
- Recipes on display. Ensure that there are either laminated index cards or recipes listed behind the bar at all times so that any member of staff - even emergency fill-ins and temps - can see exactly what is needed to prepare each drink - no more, no less. Below is an example of a recipe card and the information it should contain:
- Cocktail menus. When you leave cocktail menus on tables, make sure that each one shows exactly what is in the drink - not just the ingredients, but the ounce amounts of each. This will not only serve as a more informative drink menu to your customers, but will also allow them to more accurately measure what they've consumed over the course of the night.
- Premium ingredients. If you use premium or middle-shelf ingredients in your cocktails, make sure that your cocktail menus make a point of that fact by showing the brands used. There's no point in hiding the fact that your base spirits and liqueurs are of a higher quality than those of your competition, especially because your liquor distributor might chip in for some of the cost of printing if they're being marketed in your literature in this fashion.
- Accuracy. Make certain that the cocktail and mixed-drink recipes give a clear indication of what glass is to be used, what garnish should be used, for how long and on what setting any blended drink should be blended and what brands of alcohol should be used for their creation. If you leave anything out, you can bet someone will get it wrong - and with alarming regularity.
- Bartending recipe computer programs. For example, Interworlds Software's "BarBack for Windows" can tell your staff how to create a drink even if a customer asks for something ridiculously obscure. BarBack includes over 10,000 different drink recipes, as well as information on glassware, ingredients, mixing methods and garnishes. Rather than taking away from the skills of your staff, insightful programs such as these actually complement their skills to ensure your customers get exactly what they want in the quickest possible time. BarBack can be downloaded at www.barback.com .
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Bar & Beverage Operation, authored by Chris Parry, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
inventory managers,
Bar inventory,
bar inventory levels,
Bar staff,
bar profitability,
alcohol,
NightClub Management,
bar business,
Bar Management,
bar control,
Drink Recipes,
controling costs,
liquor products
By Chris ParryAtlantic Publishing
Part 3 of 3: Streamlining Service Areas
When you design your service area, it's important to realize that every step a bartender takes in the serving of a drink is costing you money and making your customers impatient. Where does your staff need to walk to get a clean glass? How far from there to the ice bins and then to the spirit dispenser? And where are your soda guns in relation to the bottles? Is the cash register yet another trip away from the customer? Even if your bartender has to take only four or five steps between each of these posts, consider how far that means your bartender has to walk in the course of serving 500 drinks a night! This is bad enough for a solo bartender, but when two or three people are working behind the same bar and sharing facilities, it can be an unproductive nightmare.
- Most bartenders are right-handed. With this in mind, your bar setup should allow your staff to pick up glasses with their left hands and bottles with their right, so that the drink creation process is at its most productive. If your bottles are on the left and glasses on the right, your people will do a lot of crisscrossing back and forth, resulting in more time taken to prepare a drink - and a lot more breakage and spillage.
- Consider your customers. If they're lined up three deep to get a drink, and the bar staff need to take extra steps for every drink, each of those customers doesn't just wait longer for his or her own order, but for every order ahead as well. These people are lining up to give your business money - the last thing you should do is make it difficult for them to do so.
- Low-cost equipment. If you can't afford to equip your bar with brand-new reach-in refrigerators, there is another low-cost alternative. Consider keeping a sink full of ice directly beneath the bar top. Have three or four dozen high-turnover bottled beers in the sink at all times. Your staff can refill the "Bud bins" from refrigerated stock whenever there's a slowdown in customer traffic, thereby saving dozens of unnecessary trips to the fridge every hour, not to mention giving your customers faster service.
- Pre-made mixes. To save time during their busiest periods, many bars pre-make cocktail mixes. While this is a good plan, be sure not to have these pre-made mixes sitting out in plain view. Ensure your staff don't refill them in the public eye. If your bottom line dictates that you have to use tequila from Peoria, it's best not to advertise the fact when you're charging eight bucks a drink.
The Under-Bar
Your under-bar is the engine of your bar area. If it's designed well, your staff can get from order to delivery in seconds. If it's poorly designed and dysfunctional, your customers and staff could spend a good portion of the night stuck in bar traffic.
- Focus on the customer. Employee interaction is the key. The under-bar area should contain everything your staff needs to fill 80 percent of their drink orders without moving a step away from the customer. If your staff aren't able to engage your customers in steady conversation as they're filling their orders, you're not only putting your staff through more work than they need, but you're also making your customers wait too long.
- Bar layout. If your staff can work more effectively within a smaller area of the bar, you will be able to fit more staff behind that bar during peak periods, ensuring faster service and higher productivity. Take a fresh look at the bar area and consider what changes you can make to improve productivity.
- Streamline your workstation. Many bar-fitting companies sell sink units that include speed racks, jockey boxes, ice sinks and more. They can also replace aged fittings with a minimum of fuss and expense. This will give your staff a compact, efficient workstation from which to maximize their time and effort. Prices vary, but when you consider the time, labor and customer tolerance savings, it's a purchase that will pay for itself many times over. BigTray (www.bigtray.com) can sell you this kind of equipment online or over the phone at 1-800-BIG-TRAY
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Bar & Beverage Operation, authored by Chris Parry, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
Bar inventory,
Bar staff,
bar efficiency,
bar profitability,
bar,
NightClub Management,
bar supplies,
bar business,
Bar Management,
Bar products,
opening a bar,
bar design,
Increasing Profits
By Elizabeth GodsmarkAtlantic Publishing
Accounting (bookkeeping) theft is a major concern within the beverage industry. From falsifying daily inventory records to complicated auditing abuse, this area of theft is often the most difficult to detect. Sometimes, it is the managers themselves who are behind the scams. Owners need to be aware of the following possibilities:
- Sales records - falsifying daily sales records and stealing the difference between recorded and actual cash received.
- Inflating overtime - adding overtime or extra hours to payroll records in order to increase wages.
- Discounts - recording higher-than-actual discounts when reimbursement checks from credit card companies are deposited.
- Forging signatures - making checks payable to oneself, then forging signatures or using signed blank checks, then destroying paid checks returned from the bank.
- Falsifying bank statement reconciliations - overrecording deposits that have not been recorded, underrecording outstanding checks or even deliberately miscalculating reconciliation worksheets with the intention of covering cash shortages.
- Overpaying suppliers' invoices - then converting the suppliers' refund check for personal use.
- Resubmitting invoices - duplicating requests for payment and splitting the difference with dishonest suppliers.
- Dummy companies - setting up "dummy" companies and using them to submit invoices for payment.
- "Padding" the payroll - issuing checks for fictitious members of staff or employees who no longer work for the company.
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Controlling Liquor Wine & Beverage Costs, authored by Elizabeth Godsmark, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
inventory managers,
Bar inventory,
liquor purchasing,
Bar Management,
alcohol cost,
inventory control
By Elizabeth GodsmarkAtlantic Publishing
Theft reduction policies and procedures are no good unless they are strictly enforced. Employees must be made clearly aware of the dire consequences of flouting house rules. There can be no gray areas. New members of staff should be asked to sign a confirmation that they have read the rules and fully understand the implications.
- Prohibit bartenders from totaling the cash at the end of their shifts. This policy also protects honest bar staff.
- Prohibit bartenders from both on- and off-duty drinking. Off-duty drinking leads to fellow bar staff overpouring, giving away free drinks or undercharging.
- Prohibit bartenders from taking part in physical inventory counts. Ideally this should be a management-only function.
- Bartenders should not be involved in ordering, receiving or issuing inventory. Again, this should be a management-only function.
- Security. Enforce security procedures for all liquor, wine, beer, spirits and any other high-value inventory. Also, only key personnel should have access to the storeroom.
- Require bartenders to record post-shift bar par readings. This refers to the number of bottles behind the bar at any given time. Bartenders should take a bar par reading at the end of the night shift.
- Prohibit bartenders from recording more than one transaction per drink ticket. If bartenders are allowed to use a "running" ticket, they can easily neglect to record all the drinks they have actually sold.
- Enforce voiding procedures. Bartenders should request managerial approval before continuing with a void.
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Controlling Liquor Wine & Beverage Costs, authored by Elizabeth Godsmark, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
liquor inventory,
Bar inventory,
bar inventory levels,
liquor theft,
bar theft,
Bar Management,
bar control,
inventory counting,
inventory control
By Elizabeth GodsmarkAtlantic Publishing 
A lot depends on your location. Some states have an almost monopolistic control over alcohol distribution; other states operate by licensing wholesalers. You need to familiarize yourself with county and local laws. They vary considerably from state to state. So, where do you start?
- Source a supplier. Take a look at your local beverage trade publications or Yellow Pages for a list of suppliers and wholesalers. The chances are you'll need to deal with several suppliers in order to get the full range of beverages required by your establishment.
- Service.As well as competitive prices, also look for exceptional service from your suppliers. For example, do they offer "emergency" deliveries at no extra cost to their regular customers? Time out to collect extra stock involves you in extra expense.
- Visit warehouses. Before deciding, visit a few different warehouses to see how they operate. More important, do they handle their stock with care? Bear in mind that returning faulty or poor merchandise can be time-consuming and expensive. Also, customer dissatisfaction is hard to quantify.
- Beware of hidden charges for minimum orders. Choose only a supplier that does not penalize you for minimum orders.
- Pool buying. If pool buying is legal in your state, choose a supplier that will give you the biggest savings. Negotiate, but don't compromise. Get a written quotation first.
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Controlling Liquor Wine & Beverage Costs, authored by Elizabeth Godsmark, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
Bar inventory,
bar supplies,
hotel supplies
By Elizabeth GodsmarkAtlantic Publishing
This sector of the beverage industry, known in the trade as NABs, needs to be taken very seriously if you want to cash in on current drinking trends. More customers today (often affluent, young, career-oriented clientele with plenty of disposable income) are choosing to drink NABs. Health issues, stricter DWI laws, and maybe even image are influencing their decisions to turn to NABs. The fact remains: this trend can mean big bucks. Tap into the possibilities:
- Promotions. Which NABs are consistently popular in your establishment? Buy bulk and sell on promotion. Publicize offers that your customers just cannot resist. Use a large chalkboard, or place "in-your-face" table tents on tables and at the bar.
- Specialize. Don't bother with expensive market research. Consult your regular customers. Ask them what they'd like to see on the menu. Decide on a few in-house specialties. Profits will increase noticeably, as margins for NABs are generally higher than for alcoholic beverages.
- Bottled water. This is no passing fad. Both in the dining room and at the bar, people are choosing to alternate alcoholic drinks with bottled water. Shelf dates tend to be generous (particularly for still, noncarbonated waters), so cash in: buy in bulk for big savings.
- Added value.Serve NABs in sophisticated, unusual glasses that scream "quality"! Customers will happily pay that little bit extra for a "wow" experience.
- Don't price too low. A word of warning. To make the most of this burgeoning area of the drinks market, keep your prices in line with your establishment's other alcoholic beverages. If NABs are priced too low, bartenders will be reluctant to promote them, and customers will think they're nothing special.
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Controlling Liquor Wine & Beverage Costs, authored by Elizabeth Godsmark, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
Bar inventory,
alcohol,
Bar trends,
Bar drinks
By Chris ParryAtlantic Publishing
Part 2 of 2: Protecting Your Profits
Your profit margin, like that of any business, is fragile at best. You can sit down with a calculator and try to calculate the exact percentage you'd like to see on each drink. But in practice, a little splash too much here and there can see you falling perilously close to a loss. Follow these rules and you'll be that much more likely to see your bottom line behind the bar match that of your balance sheet estimations.
- Watch what your staff pours. Regularly measure what they consider an ounce. If just one bartender overpours 40 shots a night by 25 percent, you've given away ten drinks for nothing. This kind of waste can get very expensive, especially if you have a large bar staff and they're all pouring more than 40 drinks per night.
- Have your staff keep all the liquor in the glass. Many staff members get lazy as the night wears on, and inevitably they'll start taking shortcuts. One shortcut many take is to line up three or four glasses and pour one after the other in a straight line without raising the head of the bottle. While this may save them a second or two, it also pours a lot of your product directly onto the bar surface, not to mention down the sides of the glasses that your customers are about to put in their hands. It also means your customers are far less likely to get what they've paid for. Don't let it happen.
- There are alternatives to free-pouring. While free-pouring certainly is more stylish and perhaps faster than measured pouring, it is also definitely far from accurate. As bar staff generally tend to err on the side of caution, they usually pour too much rather than too little. Control-pour spouts, such as Posi-Pour spouts, are a little more expensive than the usual free-pour, but they give a far more accurate pour without the need for clunky overhead systems or sophisticated electronics - and at much the same speed as free-pourers.
- Liquor control system. If you really want to keep an eye on your outgoings, a liquor inventory control system may be your answer. The price of setting these systems up, and maintaining them, can be significant. Then again, you get what you pay for.
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Bar & Beverage Operation, authored by Chris Parry, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
Bar inventory,
managing liquor inventory cost,
bar business,
profit,
Bar Management,
alcohol cost,
bar control,
controling costs
By Chris ParryAtlantic Publishing
Part 1: Recruiting a Security Staff
Knowing when and how to recruit security staff is an important part of any popular bar operation. Should you hire your own or deal with a security firm? If you hire your own people, what rules do you set for them? How do you avoid getting sued if someone is removed forcibly? Many venues utilize outside security firms to provide security on busy nights, and most do so as a means of simplifying their security needs and reducing liability issues. But an outside contractor doesn't always make things easier:
- Outside contractors. This means you don't need to concern yourself with compensation, holidays, sick days, wages, etc. However, it also means that your level of control over the standard and selection of those who work at your venue is reduced. Also, with security firms costing more per hour than individual contractors or staff, your bottom line can suffer. Consider hiring one or two of your own staff who you can use on regularly busy nights and filling in any gaps with contractors that may come up.
- In-house employees. While harder to find, train, and do background checks on, they are usually more loyal and tend to stay longer than contractors. If you want to have complete control over how your security behaves, how they deal with customers and their loyalty to the company, there can be no better way to work than to simply employ the best people you can find.
- Security personnel. Hiring security and calling them independent contractors to avoid liability and payroll taxes is a tactic some bar operators employ to make the process simpler and cheaper. But this can bring more problems than it solves. If your security "contractor" does injure someone when removing him or her from the premises, are you confident that your "contractor" won't claim she is an employee? Do you need that kind of a fight?
- Rules. Security guards need ironclad rules of engagement that dictate what they can and cannot do. Ensure that rules are in place that every security employee knows and signs. So, if there is a liability problem down the road, you can point out that your rules were broken and that you were not in any way negligent in your duty of care to the client.
- ALWAYS do a background check on your potential security staff. It may cost a little and extend the hiring process, but if you don't want a 300-pound cocaine addict to be throwing your customers around a back alley, you'll want to make sure you're not hiring any 300-pound cocaine addicts.
- Attorney involvement. Talk to your lawyer about drawing up any and all papers you'll need to ensure that your organization is completely covered and doing everything it can to ensure your security staff behave responsibly. Spending a hundred bucks today on legal fees can save you thousands down the road. Similarly, check with your insurance company to confirm your legal liability responsibilities to your security staff.
- Subcontracting security staff is a legitimate means of filling a need. This works if you really don't have the time to micromanage your security concerns, or to fill in during times when your regular staff is unavailable or inadequate in number. You can subcontract individuals as long as you give them a Form 1099 for any cash paid over the $600 mark; this will, in turn, keep your workers' compensation bill down.
- Equip your security staff for their job. Spotting fake IDs isn't always easy. If you have 200 people waiting to go through your door, your security staff can't spend five minutes with every person, but there are tools available that can help. An electronic ID-checking unit will read the magnetic strip on any state driver license, verify that the license is valid, and display the holder's exact age - not to mention point out if the document is a fake or has been tampered with. These systems are small, inexpensive to purchase and limit the chance that your staff will let in an underage drinker. Talk to Intelli-Check (www.intellicheck.com) by calling 800 444-9542.
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Bar & Beverage Operation, authored by Chris Parry, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
Bar inventory,
NightClub Management,
bar business,
Bar Management,
Nightclub Consulting,
opening a bar,
bar control,
Control,
inventory control
By Chris ParryAtlantic Publishing
Part 3: Theft-Reduction Procedures
More often than not, scams and thievery can be detected and/or prevented relatively easily. Strict enforcement of all employee rules is a must and vigorous prosecution of any offenders is essential. Employees must be made clearly aware of the dire consequences of flouting the house rules - every detail must be addressed.
- Have a manager total the cash at the end of a bar shift. While the bartenders may feel distrusted, you can always point out that the rule is in place to protect honest staff.
- House rules. All new members of staff should be required to sign a confirmation that they have read the house rules, fully understand the implications involved and agree to follow the rules to the letter.
- No drinking on duty. Prohibit all bartenders from drinking while on duty. Also, strictly regulate off-duty drinking. Off-duty drinking can see fellow bar staff overpouring, giving away free drinks or undercharging their colleagues, and while staff should be encouraged to socialize with patrons after hours, this should be closely watched.
- Bartenders should not be involved in the
stock-taking and inventory-counting process. Nor should they be involved in receiving, ordering or issuing inventory. It might be a painful process, but this really should be a management-only function.
- High-value inventory. Strictly enforce all security procedures for liquor, wine, beer, spirits and any other high-value inventory. Only key personnel should have access to storage areas, and everything that comes out should be duly noted.
- Require bartenders to record post-shift bar-
par readings. This refers to the number of bottles left in fridges and behind the bar after a shift has ended. Engage in spot-checking of this count to ensure that no thieving is taking place.
- Prohibit the practice of recording more than one transaction per drink ticket. If your bartenders are allowed to use a "running" ticket, they can easily neglect to record all the drinks they have actually sold and pocket the difference.
- Strictly enforce voiding procedures. If an amount is rung up on the register, the bartender should not be allowed to void it without management approval.
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Bar & Beverage Operation, authored by Chris Parry, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
liquor inventory,
Bar inventory,
bar inventory levels,
Bar staff,
liquor theft,
Bar Management,
bar control,
inventory counting,
inventory control
By Chris ParryAtlantic Publishing
Part 1: Scams to Watch For
Employees can very easily fall into a habit their employers, and if you're not careful, you can be caught out for thousands of dollars, not to mention disgruntled customers. Keep an eye out for these 14 favorites:
- The substitute. An employee buys his own bottle of a fast-moving spirit, brings it in at the start of the shift, and over the course of the night substitutes his own for the bar's bottle. Every time he sells a shot of this product, he then simply pockets the money, thus earning a large profit on his own alcohol while your stock stands still. While these people are not thieving your stock per se, they're thieving your business, so ensure you stamp or mark all of your spirit and liqueur bottles; check the empties regularly, and keep employee bags away from the bar and stockroom areas.
- The short-pour. Your bartender short-pours every shot of a particular fast-selling spirit by between 25 and 50 percent, keeps note of how many shots she's sold from the bottle and when she's sold the number of shots that usually come from the bottle, she pockets the money from the remaining shots. Make sure that you check register receipts against the bottles used, and if possible, you use a computer-controlled pouring system, to take the opportunity to scam out of the employee's hands.
- The "00." Some registers can be opened with the press of just one button or from entering in a total of $0.00. Unbeknownst to some bar operators, this is the number-one means of rip-offs by staff. A customer buys a beer and gives the bartender a fiver. "Keep the change," says the customer as he walks off, so the employee hits the "register open" button, puts in the five-dollar bill and takes out five dollars in coins and singles for his or her pocket or tip jar. How do you avoid this scam? Remove that button. Your cash register provider can do this with no problem at all, and if a customer needs change in the future, your bartender simply asks him to wait for another sale to take place. Or even better, provide change machines.
- Bogus breakage. Oops! A full vodka bottle hits the floor and the bar loses, big time. But did it really hit the floor? You might have a breakage bucket in which your staff are to put any broken bottles to show that they actually broke, but how do you know that the contents weren't poured into a hip flask beforehand? Or worse, that the contents were sold and the proceeds pocketed? The answer is simple: start a "you break it, you pay for it" rule. Of course, you don't need to enforce this rule if you don't think people are taking advantage, but it will stop the thieves.
- Wasted waste. 'The beer lines were a little gassy today." Well, that might explain the two gallons of beer waste in the drip trays - but does it really? Pocketing the money for a draft beer and pouring a glass of water into the drip tray is an age-old scam and very hard to detect. Make sure your staff keep measurements of any beer waste and keep track of who wastes what. In time, any trends should become apparent, and even if certain staff members aren't crooked, you'll be able to tell very easily if they need lessons at pouring beer.
- The backhander. Your security staff might not feel that taking ten bucks to let someone into the front of the line is wrong, but at the end of the night, when the person who paid that ten bucks has to go home because she's out of cash, it's your potential bottom line that suffers. To combat this, simply ask someone you know to go to the door and offer a kickback to jump the line. If the kickback is accepted, you need a new security guard.
- The over-charger. Your bartender either rings up a price higher than what you've set for a drink or charges regular prices but rings up "Happy Hour" prices, pocketing the difference. To combat this, ensure that cash register tapes are changed at the end of every shift and the bartender explains any "Happy Hour" discounts. Likewise, ensure that all drink prices are posted clearly for your customers so that they can identify an overcharge.
- The over-pourer. This bartender simply pours more than he or she needs to and hopes for a hefty tip. Keep an eye on your inventory, and this one should be easy to spot.
- Rounding up rounds. Bartenders tally up a round of drinks as a "total price," rather than as separate items. This makes it easier to inflate that price without it being noticed by the customers. They then pocket the difference when they ring it up. To combat this possibility, keep drink prices clearly posted behind the bar or on table menus.
- The "soft" scam. Your bartender simply neglects to charge for the mixer component of a drink, thus peeling a small bonus for every mixed drink he or she sells. This should be easy to spot if you check register ribbons, but if you don't, your staff can make a fortune.
- The "padded" tab. When your customers run a tab, the bartender pencils in an inflated total, takes the money from the customer, then later erases it, replacing it with a correct total.
Removing pencils from behind the bar and telling your staff that they must use pens is the best way to fight this one.
- The substituted cash register tape. This ingenious little plan involves the bartender leasing a cash register just like yours and bringing in his or her own prepared cash register tape, substituting it for the real tape and pocketing the cash difference. Essentially, if you keep bartenders from "Z"ing their own tapes, you'll prevent this from being possible.
- The refund. This is a simple, small-time scam where the bartender claims that a discrepancy in his or her takings was refunded to a customer for money lost in faulty vending machines or gaming equipment. Have any customer seeking a refund fill in a small claim form, with phone number and ID details included, and this shouldn't be an issue. Most customers won't mind doing this if they have a legitimate refund claim.
- The jigger switch. The bartender brings in his or her own shot glass that seems identical to your normal barware, but is actually smaller. After several short measures, the bartender can start pocketing money without the inventory showing a shortage. Fight this by clearly marking your pouring measures and doing regular checks of your bar equipment.
This article is an excerpt from the Food Service Professional Guide to Bar & Beverage Operation, authored by Chris Parry, published by Atlantic Publishing Company. This excerpt has been reprinted with permission of the publisher. To purchase this book go to:
Atlantic Publishing Company
Amazon.com
Topics:
liquor inventory,
Bar inventory,
liquor theft,
bar business,
Bar Management,
bar control,
inventory counting,
inventory control
