Lets Talk About You... What Do You Think of Me?

Everyone wants to know how to turn a first time bar visitor into a regular guest. Assuming you provide a decent product at a good price point, the answer to the question is just over on the other side of the bar. It is your bartender.

A great bartender should have three basic skills:

1) Speed and coordination to work in an organized fashion in full view of all, making drinks while interacting with guests.

2) Excellent cash handling.

3) Personality. Smiling, upbeat, and communicative with everyone.

Employers tend to focus on the first two technical skills, but in terms of building the business, they are focusing on the wrong skill set. Personality should be the priority. You can teach most anyone to make the drinks, consolidate their steps, and to cash handle properly, but you cannot teach them to be a smiling, interactive, people-person who will build your business. Yet in nearly every establishment I have gone to nightly in 27 years of mystery shopping, I rarely meet anyone I could honestly say I would want to return to see because I enjoyed their service and they made me feel welcome. Or to look at it another way, if I was opening a new bar, I rarely see someone I would immediately approach with a job offer.

I find three basic levels of bartenders. Level 1 are the most prevalent; 20- something young servers you promoted to the bar from the wait staff. They look good, they have energy, and they want the job. Never mind they have no idea what most classic cocktails are, you have a recipe book available for just such an eventuality. These bartenders will smile, greet the guest, take the initial order, accurately enter the sale... and then never speak to the guest again until it is time for them to go. I find nearly all of these kids are incapable of initiating and carrying on a conversation with an adult they do not know. They would never think to introduce themselves, ask for your name, and actually ask questions of you, even about mundane topics like sports or weather. They use free time to chat with pals on the wait staff, or chat with the regular guests they do know by name, or text their friends on their cellphones. The non-slacker version of this bartender will use free time to wipe down bottles or wipe down the bar top, but the result is the same; new guests sitting in silence watching TV,  albeit at a cleaner looking bar.

Level 2 bartenders actually have some personality and do not seem intimidated by speaking with guests of any age they do not know. But tell me if this does not sound like a lot of bartenders working for you right now… every time they open their mouth, it is to talk about themselves.  “I worked here, I did this, I vacationed here, I am dating this person, I drink these...”, When one of these folks actually asks a question of the guest it is something akin to “so let’s talk about you. What do you think of me?”

Your day bartender is likely a level 2. Someone who can work fast, work without much supervision, and get along with both staff and guests. Unless you run a very tight ship, this is also the person you leave alone in charge when you leave the building, and have no problem handing over the register and liquor room keys to. This is the person you trust the most. This is also the first person you want shopped, because in my experience the day bartender is often a superfecta of over pouring,  sliding drinks to regulars, and stealing cash sales, while still finding a way to completely ignore new guests.

Level 3 bartenders sadly are the rarest of the rare; personable, engaging, part Regis Philbin and part Sigmund Freud.  One woman I found was working a full bar but she found the time to chat with everyone. She asked questions about where people worked as she poured drinks for others, inquired about why they were in this area, and introduced herself while asking guests their names and then remembering and using them several minutes later. An even bigger surprise was when I returned six months later and she remembered my name, what I drank, where I had told her I lived and brought up the last subject we had been talking about half a year ago. Why must this be the exception rather than the rule? No, she did not look like a runway model and she could have been a grandmother for all I know, but I would hire her in a heartbeat... and frequent this bar as often as possible if it wasn't 90 minutes away. She would build your business.

From my own time as a general manager I know most of you hire from within. You hold out a carrot to keep your best dining room servers from leaving by “promoting” them to the bar, where they can work with a little more autonomy and often make more money, but the best servers do not always make the best bartenders. These are usually very good employees and as a server they were always on time, worked whatever shifts were asked of them, were always smiling, and exhibited great teamwork. Then you put them on the bar and inside of a month the Dr Jekyll/ Mr Hyde transformation is complete. They turn into everyone else on the staff they used to be so much different from and who they used to be so much better than.  

Hire only the “people person” for your bar. The ones who can easily both initiate and hold a conversation with a 22 year old or a 60 year old, who ask questions and listen for the answers, make eye contact easily, and are comfortable shaking hands and thanking guests for coming in and then asking them to return. You can coach them up on drink making, consolidation skills, and cash handling. Their ability to create a personable bond with the guest is what will create a guest’s personal bond with your business.