June 2018
THE HOW-TO PUBLICATION
BAR BUS NESS MAGAZINE
the Frozen drinks can reinvent your cocktail program.
Plus: BAR TOUR
Resurrecting an original speakeasy
INVENTORY CONTROL
What you don’t know may mean lost profits
KITCHEN EQUIPMENT
Four types of equipment to increase efficiency
CL E R MON T K . Y.
U. S .
THIS IS NOT YOUR PARTICIPATION TROPHY.
EVERY BIT EARNED KNOB CREEK® KENTUCKY STRAIGHT BOURBON WHISKEY 50% ALC./VOL. ©2018 KNOB CREEK DISTILLERY CLERMONT, KY.
Contents
June
How Tos
18 23
Kitchen Innovations
Four types of kitchen equipment to increase your efficiency.
Taking Stock of Your Stock
What you don’t know may mean lost profits and missed opportunities.
Departments
4
From the Editor
6
On Tap
A letter from our Editor Ashley Bray. Industry news & announcements.
10
Behind The Bar
16
Happenings
In-depth analysis of beer, wine, and spirits. Important dates for the month.
34
Bar Tour
40
Inventory
44
Q+A
Resurrecting an original speakeasy.
SC1
Featured product releases.
POS Trendsetters
Kelley Jones – Hospitality Alliance
A round-up of the innovators in the point-of-sale space.
Features
30
Shifting Gears
The new Shift4 Payments simplifies and integrates POS systems and payment processing.
Contents photo: Harriet Andronikides COVER PHOTO: Shutterstock/ Igisheva Maria
barbizmag.com
June 2018
Bar Business Magazine
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THE HOW-TO PUBLICATION
BAR BUS NESS MAGAZINE
June 2018
What is your favorite kelvin slush Co. cocktail?
Vol. 11
No. 6
Bar Business Magazine (ISSN 1944-7531) is published by Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation 55 Broad St 26th Fl., New York, NY 10004
subscription department 800-895-4389
executive offices President Arthur J. McGinnis, Jr. Publisher Art Sutley 212-620-7247 asutley@sbpub.com
editorial
Editor Ashley Bray 212-620-7220 abray@sbpub.com
“An icy twist on my favorite cocktail — the Frozen Negroni.”
Contributing Writers Tony Cross, Emily Eckart, Elyse Glickman
art
Art Director Nicole Cassano Graphic Designer Aleza Leinwand
production
Corporate Production Director Mary Conyers mconyers@sbpub.com Digital Ad Operations Associate Kevin Fuhrmann
“I love wine, so I always go for a Frośe cocktail on a warm summer day.”
circulation
Circulation Director Maureen Cooney mcooney@sbpub.com
advertising sales Art Sutley 212-620-7247 asutley@sbpub.com
Bar Business Magazine (Print ISSN 1944-7531, Digital ISSN 2161-5071) (USPS#000-342) is published February, April, June, August, October, and December. January, March, May, July, September, and November will only be offered in a digital format at no charge by Simmons-Boardman Publ. Corp, 55 Broad St. 26th Floor, New York, NY 10004. Printed in the U.S.A. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY and Additional mailing offices. Pricing, Qualified U.S. Bar Owners may request a free subscription. Non-qualified subscriptions printed or digital version: 1 year US $45.00; Canada $90.00; foreign $189.00; foreign, air mail $289.00. 2 years US $75.00; Canada $120.00; foreign $300.00; foreign, air mail $500.00. BOTH Print & Digital Versions: 1 year US $68.00; Canada $135.00; foreign $284.00; foreign, air mail $384.00. 2 years US $113.00; Canada $180.00; foreign $450.00; foreign, air mail $650.00. Single Copies are $10.00 ea. Subscriptions must be paid for in U.S. funds only. COPYRIGHT © Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation 2018. All rights reserved. Contents may not be reproduced without permission. For reprint information contact: Art Sutley, Phone (212) 620-7247, or asutley@ sbpub.com. For Subscriptions, & address changes, Please call (800) 895-4389, (402) 346-4740, Fax (402) 346-3670, e-mail barbusiness@omeda.com or write to: Bar Business Magazine, SimmonsBoardman Publ. Corp, PO Box 3135, Northbrook, IL 60062-3135. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Bar Business Magazine, PO Box 3135, Northbrook, IL 60062-3135. Instructional information in this magazine should only be performed by skilled craftspeople with the proper equipment. The publisher and authors of information provided herein advise all readers to exercise care when engaging in any of the how-to activities published in the magazine. Further, the publisher and authors assume no liability for damages or injuries resulting from projects contained herein.
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Bar Business Magazine
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Photos: Kelvin Slush Co.
“As a writer, I have to say the Hemingway Daiquiri.”
Tobin Ellis, founder and CEO of BarMagic.
Imagine bar equipment conceived by a renowned bartender, and built by Perlick Perlick’s new Tobin Ellis Signature Cocktail Station is a breakthrough achievement in underbar design resulting from an ambitious collaboration between 6-time national bartending champion and celebrated bar designer, Tobin Ellis and the award-winning engineering team at Perlick.
“Together, we’ve built a cocktail station that’s perfect for everything from craft cocktail bars to high-volume nightclubs and 5-star/5-diamond hotel environments. It’s the tricked-out station every serious bartender has dreamt about and every savvy operator has hoped for.” INTRODUCING TOBIN ELLIS SIGNATURE DRAFT COCKTAIL SYSTEM
Tobin Ellis
Serving craft cocktails on tap is a great way to quickly elevate your beverage program and increase revenue and profits. Check it out at perlick.com/commercial
Exclusively from Perlick Contact Perlick today to learn more! perlick.com • 800.558.5592
from the editor
From The Editor
It’s not a faith in technology. It’s faith in people.”
- Steve Jobs
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Bar Business Magazine
T
hese days, whenever I step onto a tradeshow floor, I get the sense that we’re living in the “future” we’ve always talked about. We may not have the hover boards or self-tying shoes of Back to the Future or flying cars a la The Jetsons (although Uber is looking to change that), but we are moving into some pretty futuristic spaces. The National Restaurant Association Show in Chicago further confirmed this feeling for me last month. At a press event on the first day, a robotic serving table from Bear Robotics, Inc. stole the show as it roved around tables and members of the media. More examples of robots and automation could be found all over the halls of McCormick Place—like the Bbot drink delivery system and Babylon MicroFarms™, which harnesses the power of the Internet of Things to automate and control indoor growing. We may not be at The Jetsons level, but we’re certainly living in what seems like a real-life Minority Report. In fact, facial recognition technology and how it can be used to automate the order and payment process was discussed during the NRA Show’s SuperSession: The Future of Restaurants. The session also covered tech and robotics and how it’s all poised to change—or in some cases is already changing—the restaurant and bar industry. I have a confession to make before we go any further into this letter: When I first started seeing some of these products and technology developments over the last year or so, I thought they were gimmicks aimed at replacing the human element,
which is what makes our industry so great. I’ve since come around to see the light, and it’s because I had things all wrong. These products and technologies aren’t gimmicks, and they aren’t here to replace humans—their aim is actually to increase efficiencies, improve workflow, and free up staff. For example, in a promotional video for Bbot, the company explains that the robot frees up bartenders to do what they do best—make great drinks—versus spending time taking orders and payments. It doesn’t hurt that robots are still a novelty and a big crowd-pleaser, which can result in increased interest and sales. It can be alarming to see a piece of plastic or metal with some form of built-in artificial intelligence doing your job by serving patrons or taking orders. But it’s important to remember that these products will never replace the human element of hospitality, nor do they aim to. If a waitress doesn’t need to spend time running orders from the kitchen to her tables, or a bartender doesn’t need to worry about the process of handling a payment, then they are free to spend that time on more valuable tasks—upselling, crafting quality cocktails, and improving the guest experience.
Ashley bray, Editor
June 2018 barbizmag.com
T
ON TAP Nightclub & Bar 2018: A Post-Show Report
he 33rd annual Nightclub & Bar Show took place at the Las Vegas Convention Center March 26-28. The convention featured a packed expo floor with hundreds of suppliers as well as the return of the F&B Innovation Center, which made its debut last year. Pavilions dedicated to the Hospitality of Cannabis, New Products, Emerging Brands, Craft Brews, and eSports & Gaming (new this year) dotted the show floor. The show also included keynote speakers; certification sessions; unparalleled events at nightclubs OMNIA, XS, Hakkasan, and Hyde; and a series of 70-plus educational workshops. This year’s education series was highlighted by keynote presentations from King of Miami Nightlife David Grutman, NFL Analyst and former Quarterback Ron “Jaws” Jaworski, and the first-ever eSports, Streaming and Innovation panel, “The Bar of Tomorrow.” The keynote program identified business strategies used by the most influential minds in the 6
Bar Business Magazine
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industry as well as the ways owners and operators can leverage new trends to break through the mold and succeed in the industry. “The Nightclub & Bar Show offers industry professionals the opportunity to learn from one another, from their strengths, weaknesses, successes, and failures,” said Thom Greco, Chairman of the Nightclub & Bar Advisory Board. “Each year, we work to create programming that provides new concepts and innovations that keep up with the ever-changing trends within our industry.” The expo floor opened with a starstudded red carpet and ribbon cutting ceremony with Chairman of the Las Vegas Host Committee Oscar Goodman; pro BMX rider Ricardo Laguna; celebrated Chef Brian Duffy; Jackyl lead singer Jesse James Dupree; and “Vanderpump Rules” stars Tom Sandoval and Scheana Marie. Jaworski served as the ribbon cutter for the 2018 convention. In total, 36,384 attendees visited the show, which was a 17% increase over
years past. Of all those attendees, 36.45% were from bar/pub/tavern/ lounges and 25.21% came from nightclubs. 57.88% of attendees represented single-unit venues, 39.18% owned multi-unit establishments, and 2.93% attendees were licensed/had plans to open. The top reasons for attending the show were to identify new suppliers, gather information to make purchasing decisions, meet with current suppliers, and maintain industry relationships. For those looking to make purchases, some of the top interest categories included bar supplies, bar technology/POS, and marketing, promotion, and services. A number of industry trends emerged at the show including virtual reality, gaming, chargers, and cannabis. For more on these trends, read “From the Editor,” in our April 2018 issue. Mark your calendars for next year’s show, which returns to the Las Vegas Convention Center March 25-27, 2019. ncbshow.com
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Photo: Getty Images.
From ON TAP The Editor
Get PREMIUM SAVINGS for 2 YEARS! Access to over 185 of the best sports,
news and entertainment channels
Get COMMERCIAL XTRA PACK for ™
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$
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MO. Plus taxes.
For 24 mos. with 24-mo. agmt. after Auto Bill Pay discount.*
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at no extra cost for first 3 months
After 3 mos., services automatically continue at then-prevailing rate (currently $37.99/mo.) unless changed/canceled.
Plus, pack the house with these add-on
Sports Packages!
Get up to $500 credit with purchase of 2018 NFL SUNDAY TICKET One-time credit of $200 for FCO 1–200 (excluding Small Bar Offer) or $500 for FCO 201+. Credit will post to bill after 9/9 start and may take up to 2 billing cycles. *ALL DIRECTV OFFERS REQUIRE 24-MO. TV AGREEMENT. EARLY CANCELLATION FEE OF $20/MO. FOR EACH MONTH REMAINING ON AGMT. ADD’L FEES APPLY. PRICE IS AFTER A $10/MO. AUTO BILL PAY DISCOUNT FOR 24 MOS. New approved commercial customers only. Credit card req’d (except MA & PA). Pricing based on Estimated Viewing Occupancy (EVO) for select packages. Regional Sports Network (RSN) fee applies in certain markets.
89% of bar and restaurant subscribers agree that adding DIRECTV to their business has been a good decision.1 1
Based on a January 2018 national survey of bar and restaurant subscribers who expressed an opinion.
Call us now at
1.855.714.7210 to order! ¹Based on a January 2018 national survey of Bar and Restaurant Subscribers who expressed an opinion. N=500 current Public Viewing subscribers (Bar or BLK) with a tenure of at least 3 months. COMMERCIAL XTRA PACK 24-MO. OFFER: Ends 10/28/18. To receive the promotional price of $89.99/mo., a 24-mo. agreement is required. After 24 mos., then-prevailing rate for base pkg applies unless canceled or changed by customer prior to end of the promotional period. Not stackable with any base package offers. ABP OFFER: New customers who subscribe to BUSINESS SELECT PACK or above with 24-mo. agmt. and enroll in Auto Bill Pay at time of sale will receive $10/ mo. bill credit for 24 mos. starting in the second mo. After 24 mos., the credit will end and services will automatically continue at the then-prevailing rate. $200 BILL CREDIT OFFER: To receive the promotional one-time credit of $200, customers must sign up for 2018 NFL SUNDAY TICKET with Fire Code Occupancy (FCO) 1-200 (excluding Small Bar Offer). Credit to be issued on or after 9/9/18. May take up to two billing cycles for credit to appear after 9/9/18. FCO validation certificate must be approved. NFL SUNDAY TICKET must be activated. $500 BILL CREDIT OFFER: To receive the promotional one-time credit of $500, customers must sign up for 2018 NFL SUNDAY TICKET with Fire Code Occupancy (FCO) 201 or above. Credit to be issued on or after 9/9/18. May take up to two billing cycles for credit to appear. FCO validation certificate must be approved. NFL SUNDAY TICKET must be activated. HARDWARE OFFER: Programming agreement, as defined by customer’s commercial programming rate card, required. Offer available to new commercial customers in commercial structures no more than three stories high. No single-family residences allowed. Up to four HD Receivers included per commercial location. Make and model of system at DIRECTV’s sole discretion. Offer void where prohibited or restricted. DIRECTV SVC TERMS: Subject to terms of DIRECTV Commercial Customer Agreement. Add’l Fees & Terms: Regional Sports Network Fee of up to $24.99/mo. applies in certain markets for COMMERCIAL XTRA PACK subscribers residing in a RSN ZIP code and one of the Collegiate-in-Market regions where BTN, Longhorn Network or SEC Network is included. Regional Sports Network fees are updated biannually based on the presence of Regional Sports Networks and/or Collegiate-in-Market programming in applicable ZIP codes. Receiver fees of $15/mo. apply for each receiver for COMMERCIAL XTRA PACK. $19.95 Handling and Delivery fee may apply. Taxes not included. Programming, pricing, terms and conditions subject to change at any time. INSTALLATION: Standard commercial installation included for BUSINESS SELECT PACK and above customers. Complex/custom installation extra. Applicable use tax adjustment may apply on retail value of installation. Visit directv.com/legal or call for details. To access HD programming, HD equipment required. Number of HD channels based on package selection. All DIRECTV Receivers must be continuously connected to the same land-based phone line or the Internet. NFL, the NFL Shield design and the NFL SUNDAY TICKET name and logo are registered trademarks of the NFL and its affiliates. NFL team names and uniform designs are registered trademarks of the teams indicated. ©2018 AT&T Intellectual Property. All Rights Reserved. AT&T, Globe logo, DIRECTV and all other DIRECTV marks contained herein are trademarks of AT&T Intellectual Property and/or AT&T affiliated companies. All other marks are the property of their respective owners.
From ON TAP The Editor Master of Mezcal
Strongbow Original Dry Cider—It’s Back!
1
N
ew York’s Mulberry Project hosted Tulum, Mexico’s first cocktail competition on April 30th. The competition sought to crown the “Master of Mezcal” and was produced together with Gracias A Dios mezcal. Approximately 30 bartenders submitted mezcal recipes to compete, and Gracias A Dios chose nine finalists who competed in two rounds at the Mulberry Project pop-up at La Zebra Hotel in Tulum. The first round was all about speed and challenged contestants to make three drinks—a Mezcal Margarita, Mezcal Negroni, and Mezcal Mule— in the fastest possible time. The second round tasked contestants with making a bespoke cocktail using ingredients found in a “mystery box”: cucumber, mango, apple, jalapeño, basil, habanero syrup, celery bitters, Campari, banana liquor, and yellow chanteuse. Bartenders had three minutes to look at the box ingredients, choose at least three, and create a cocktail for the judges. Three judges presided over the two rounds: Michael Martensen, F&B
Director Fairmont Mayakoba; Jasper Soffer, Owner of Mulberry Project; and Sam Jimenez, Gracias a Dios Mezcal. Quetzal Ortiz de Luca, Bartender at Encanto in Tulum, was crowned the winner. He clocked in at 1:43 on the speed round and mixed up a mezcal cocktail using four ingredients from the mystery box in his recipe: 2 oz Mezcal, six pieces of cucumber, a piece of jalapeño, one drop celery bitters, ¼ oz habanero syrup, ¾ oz lime juice, ½ oz simple syrup, and a Tajin rim. Quetzal won a weekend in Oaxaca and a trip to the Gracias A Dios distillery. Second place went to Daniela Zea Carrera from Be Tulum, who won a free day of drinks and food at Mulberry Project’s pop-up at La Zebra Hotel and a bottle of Gracias A Dios Agave Gin. Third place winner Juan Carlos Barrera López of Gitano took home a Gracias A Dios goodie bag.
Tulum’s first cocktail competition crowned the Master of Mezcal.
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Bar Business Magazine
Strongbow.com
lazebratulum.com/mulberryproject
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Photo (left): Daniel Gastaldi.
Quetzal Ortiz de Luca took home the Master of Mezcal title.
00,000-plus consumers in over 160,000 social media mentions have been asking for it, and this summer, it’s coming back—Strongbow® Hard Ciders’ Original Dry returns. “We’re bringing this flavor back to the U.S. to provide our consumers with the drier, crisp, and refreshing taste of Strongbow they’ve been pressing us for,” said Jessica Robinson, Vice President, Portfolio Brands at HEINEKEN USA. A dry cider made with a mixture of bittersweet and culinary apples for a crisp, less sweet taste, Original Dry contains no artificial flavors or colors. The 5% ABV dry cider will be available nationally starting in June 2018 in 16.9ounce, single-serve cans and four-pack 16.9-ounce cans. Strongbow® Original Dry 16.9-ounce cans will be available first in on-premise accounts starting in June to meet the needs of consumers seeking new tastes and engaging experiences. Expansion to off-premise locations will soon follow. A full visibility program with new and impactful POS elements will support the launch. A 360-degree marketing plan will build awareness through highly targeted digital, social, and PR engagement focused specifically around Strongbow fans. Strongbow® is capitalizing on the rising growth of cans, too. “Cider single serve is up +10% and cider cans are up +22.2%,” said Robinson. “We’ll continue to take advantage of this growth with the 16.9-ounce Original Dry can and provide our consumers with the authentic cider they want in a package they prefer.”
From ON TAP The Editor
ON TAP
Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters Comes Stateside
N
orth American Beverage Company (NAB) has announced that it will be distributing Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters in the United States. It’s the first time the product will be distributed domestically in the United States. Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters combines the tart sweetness of a lemon-lime soft drink with Angostura® aromatic bitters. In fact, the product is the only soft drink in the world that contains authentic Angostura® aromatic bitters. Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters was launched in 2007 in Australia, where it is still very popular today. NAB is no stranger to the carbonated mixer segment as it already distributes Barritt’s Ginger Beer and Flathead Lake Gourmet Soda, so Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters was a natural fit into the company’s portfolio. NAB also chose the product for its unique taste and well-known history— Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters may have been launched in 2007, but Angostura® aromatic bitters have been made with the same original secret recipe since 1824, when Dr. Johann Siegert created it as a curative elixir for soldiers fighting on the frontlines of war. Bartenders the world over will recognize Angostura® aromatic bitters as it remains the definitive ingredient in many well-known classic and contemporary cocktails. “There’s a lot of good mixologists out there who have a lot of respect for the name Angostura, and we hope to connect with them with this product,” says Alanah Lorusso, Assistant Brand Manager at NAB.
NAB also sees Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters as the perfect fit for the busy pub or bar that still wants to serve up quality cocktails to patrons who have come to expect craft cocktails from every establishment they visit. “We’re really going after that pub market, which is looking to make unique, quality craft cocktails at higher volume,” says Lorusso. “We think we have a good niche here in the US with those bartenders who have a real busy night, still want to serve something unique, but may not have the chance to simply due to volume concerns.” The cocktail possibilities for Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters are only limited by the bartender’s imagination. The product mixes well
with whiskey, vodka, and gin, and it can be used in simple highball recipes in a two-to-one ratio with any of those spirits. These highball recipes would prove especially beneficial for those high-volume bars looking to add a new, quick cocktail without sacrificing any quality. Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters can also be mixed into more complex creations, and its rose hue adds a unique dash of color to any cocktail. Angostura® Lemon, Lime and Bitters is available in 750 ml resealable glass bottles and 12 oz cans. Distribution will continue to grow across the country going into the summer months. northamericanbeverage.com/ angostura-lemon-lime-bitters
What’s Trending On BARBIZMAG.COM Score additional revenue
Use a DIRECTV business package to start making money with your TVs. Visit our Multimedia channel to download the white paper and learn how to deliver a money-making service that “turns customers into regulars.” barbizmag.com
new heineken usa ceo
HEINEKEN USA announced the appointment of Maggie Timoney as the new Chief Executive Officer. Learn more about the seasoned executive with over twenty-five years of experience in beer & cider business.
Missed may?
If you missed our May digital-only issue, don’t worry! You can catch up on all the articles and your favorite columns on our website. We suggest you start with the Behind the Bar column on the hot can cocktails trend! June 2018
Bar Business Magazine
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Behind The Bar
Let’s talk
Break the ice with innovative ways to speed up your cocktail program. BY Tony Cross
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A
few years ago, when I used to run a restaurant bar program, there were many things that I took delight in, such as debuting a brand-new cocktail menu. Countless hours of trial and error, brainstorming (i.e., talking to myself), and tasting, tasting, and tasting would finally come to fruition for my guests to hopefully take delight in. Once we went live with the new drinks, the tickets would start pouring in, and I couldn’t be happier. However, the first night or two would almost feel like running a gauntlet; finding my flow while crafting these new drinks on the fly wasn’t always a breeze,
and every now and then, I knew I’d have to leave my ego at the door and take one of the newbies off the menu. Depending on your venue and how you’re staffed, it’s not always wise to have 10 drinks on the menu that each have a hundred steps before it’s in front of your guests. I quickly learned to integrate punches and bottle cocktails that could be served just as quickly as pouring a glass of wine. Since then, I’ve been introduced to lots of new ways and styles of batched elixirs—one of them being frozen cocktails. Think back to your first memories of frozen adult beverages. I remember going to the bowling alley with my
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Photo Credit: Shutterstock/ Arina P Habich.
frozen cocktails
JEVO ™ does all the work to make hundreds of gelatin shots in minutes.
The great customer experience, the high profit margin, these are reasons why we love gelatin shots. But making them is a hassle. Jevo is fully automated and makes hundreds of shots in minutes, turning gelatin shots into a steady source of fast, hassle-free incremental revenue for your bar. Jevo also promotes at the point of decision and tracks usage. Then, it smartly ships you more flavor pod supplies right when you need them. Basically, Jevo is everything you could want from a profit center.
Š 2017 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Behind The Bar
FROZEN COCKTAILS ARE A WAY TO INTEGRATE DRINKS THAT CAN BE SERVED AS QUICKLY AS POURING A GLASS OF WINE.
IF YOU DON’T HAVE A SLUSHY MACHINE USE CRUSHED ICE AND GIVE THE DRINK A GOOD SHAKE.
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Bar Business Magazine
family in the early nineties and seeing a daiquiri machine. I didn’t know that it was a daiquiri; all I knew was that it looked like something for kids that I wasn’t allowed to drink. Once I was of age, I finally got to have a frozen cocktail of my own in New Orleans. I honestly can’t tell you if my slushy Hurricanes were nice and balanced; I was in my early twenties, and it was a vehicle to a destination. Trends usually come and go in waves, and luckily for cocktails, we’re blessed with creative men and women behind the bar that can make what was once unpalatable, desirable. So, I headed out to a few bars and restaurants in the Triangle of North Carolina to find out the inspirations and tricks for getting frozen cocktails just right. If you’ve ever experienced a Carolina summer, you’ll know that the heat and humidity is almost enough to beat you down to the point where you’re asking the bartender for a Zima—almost. Chapel Hill was my first stop, and I looked no further than Crook’s Corner on the infamous Franklin Street. I’m pretty certain that in the almost thirty-six years that they’ve been in business, the frozen cocktail (for central North Carolina) started here. The frozen mint julep has been a staple at Crook’s for so long that most of the staff couldn’t agree on how long it’s been on the menu. “The frozen mint julep has been
around longer than I have, which is thirteen years now,” says Bartender Mark Hullopeter. A passing staff member quickly interrupts, “It hasn’t been that long— it’s only been ten years.” Hullopeter assures me that his story checks out, “The origin of the cocktail is that the bar manager at the time didn’t want to carry Rebel Yell (bourbon whiskey) anymore and was trying to figure out a way to get rid of it. He came up with the idea of adding two scoops of mint sorbet with a shot of Rebel Yell—making the drink taste like a sweeter version of a mint julep. We’re a southern restaurant, and mint juleps are the pinnacle of the southern cocktail…so needless to say, we still carry Rebel Yell.” Watching him quickly create the frozen julep didn’t get my hopes up; it was prepared exactly how he told me— two scoops of mint sorbet in a rocks glass with a shot of Rebel Yell on top. Tasting it was a different story. The sorbet absorbs the bourbon whiskey and gives the cocktail a nice balance of mint, whiskey, and sugar, but it isn’t too sweet. Other than it being dangerously delicious (I made myself leave after one), Hullopeter attributes the ease of being able to make the drink in seconds flat as one of the reasons why it’s their number-one selling cocktail. “It’s great because I take a glass to the kitchen (which is six feet away from behind the bar) and get it back and put a shot in it,
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Photo: Tony Cross.
BARS HAVE EVEN USED UNIQUE INGREDIENTS IN THEIR FROZEN COCKTAILS LIKE MINT SORBET OR THE JAPANESE LIQUOR SHOCHU.
Primal Food & Spirits’ frozen Moscow Mule.
Behind The Bar
Frozen Rum & Tonic 1 ½ oz Aged rum ¾ oz Tonic syrup (Rob uses Alley Twenty-Six Tonic) ¾ oz Pineapple juice ½ oz Fresh lime juice 4 dashes Angostura Bitters
Combine all ingredients (sans the bitters) with crushed ice in a cocktail shaker. Shake like hell or until you can’t feel your hands. Pour into a Pilsner glass. Top with crushed ice and four dashes of Angostura bitters. Garnish with a large sprig of mint and dehydrated lime wheel.
and off it goes,” he says. “On any given night, our frozen mint julep can account for a quarter of all of our cocktail sales.” The restaurant scene in downtown Durham has exploded in the past decade. A town that took a backseat in the culinary department to neighboring city Raleigh isn’t in the shadows anymore. Dashi, a Japanese ramen shop and izakaya (Japanese pub that’s located above the restaurant), has only had their doors open for a few years, but the combination of yummy
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and speed have kept their guests coming back for more great ramen dishes and cocktails. “All of the cocktails for both floors are made up here. So when the staff downstairs are really busy, they push these,” says Bar Manager Gabe Turner as he points to his slushy machines. “They’re delicious too, so it’s not like we’re substituting some sort of quality for efficiency.” Turner saw it as a no-brainer when it came to purchasing a slushy machine. “I’ve always seen myself as a home ice-cream maker. This was some kind of extension for when it came time to start thinking about flavor profiles, recipes, and how sugars freeze; I actually have a lot of experience with that,” he says. “When we started fooling around with recipes, we stumbled into a pretty good template and we’ve expanded on it a lot over the last two and a half years. We don’t like to use too much sugar; using an oleo-saccharum (oil-sugar) helps us keep a nice balance in our drinks.” You won’t find Turner and Co. doing frozen margaritas though. “The style we’re doing is a Japanese cocktail called ‘chuhai,’ which traditionally is shochu [fermented Japanese liquor made from sweet potato, barley, rice, and other ingredients that is usually lower in proof] and fresh juice. In Japan, they call them ‘sours,’” says Turner, who explains that Dashi decided to do a frozen version of the chuhais. “We used shochu, fresh juice, and then sake to round it out. To get the alcohol level up, we’ll add a little bit of vodka, but not to change the flavor profiles.” So just how popular are these frozen chuhais? “The summertime [which Turner calls their “peak season”] is a mix of convenience and something being super delicious and refreshing,” says Turner. “I’ll make a whole batch of our slushy cocktails every week.” Each batch serves around 50 eight-ounce drinks. “We use the Bunn slushy machines and have a second machine in the back that we cycle so they don’t get too burned out since they’re always being used, 24/7,” says Turner. “Rarely ever does it not sell out.” Dashi carries two different slushy cocktails at a time, and one of the current chuhai slushies combines the classic ingredients
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Photos (this spread): Tony Cross.
Rob Mariani, Alley Twenty-Six
Behind The Bar along with a spicy ginger syrup, orange oils, and juice. Not bad for a bar known for their myriad sake and shochu bottles. Primal Food & Spirits Owner Tim Lyons takes his cocktails just as serious as his gluten-free restaurant. The Durham establishment’s kitchen is 100% gluten-free with absolutely no cross-contamination. Business has showed no signs of slowing down in the three years since he’s opened. Lyons has made sure to create a spot on their drink list for a cocktail with fresh ingredients that’s able to be poured in seconds flat. Primal’s frozen Moscow Mule, made with Tito’s Vodka, ginger syrup, water, and lime, rotates in a slushy machine located behind the bar. Lyons newest venture is King Street Bar, which will have a more laid-back approach to cocktails with several nooks and crannies where guests can enjoy themselves. “Having frozen cocktails available will be important for us when we’re extremely busy,” says Lyons. The new bar’s signature frozen cocktail is The King Street: bourbon, elderflower liqueur, lemon, and a blueberry compote. What if your establishment doesn’t want to invest or can’t find room for a large slushy machine? Get creative. A block away from Dashi, popular cocktail lounge Alley Twenty-Six has their own twist on frozen drinks. “While a slushy machine is on the wish list for Alley Twenty-Six, we do not have one yet. That doesn’t mean we can’t make ‘frozen’ drinks,” says longtime bartender and representative of the popular statewide Alley Twenty-Six Tonic Syrup Rob Mariani. “By using crushed ice and giving it a good shake, you can get a drink that mimics a slushy and has a similar dilution rate. “One would think that smaller ice melts faster than larger ice, which would be true if we were looking at two cubes melting on their own. But when you pack a glass full of crushed ice, there is lots of surface area, and the dilution rate is quite slow.” Mariani has mastered this technique and says to add a bit more sugar to your specs. “The ideal ABV [for a frozen cocktail] is about 10% and the max is around 18%. Anything above that will not result in a frozen texture,” says Mariani. “Bitterness and sweetness are suppressed by cold temperatures, so more sugar is needed to achieve a balanced, frozen drink. Up your sweet by 50%. For example, instead of using a half-ounce of simple, use three-fourths of an ounce.” There are many ways to master a frozen cocktail, but in the end, it’s ultimately your decision on which direction to take and why. Having a machine constantly rotating the perfect, temperature-controlled slushy is a wise decision in highvolume establishments or one with longer-than-normal wait times because of a laborious cocktail menu. Having a cocktail in seconds will help alleviate the time away from interacting with guests and making their experience one worth returning to, which is, after all, what hospitality is all about.
Frozen Ginger Chuhai 64 oz Fresh ginger juice 32 oz Fresh orange juice 32 oz Fresh lemon/lime Juice 96 oz Futsuu Sake 32 oz Orange oleo saccharum 25 oz Chiyonosono 8,000 Generations kome shōchū 25 oz Social House Vodka from Kinston, NC 16 oz Plantation Rum Original Dark 25 dashes Regan’s Orange Bitters 25 dashes Bitterman’s Buckspice Ginger Bitters Combine all ingredients. Follow your slushy machine’s directions for the addition of any water or other elements before adding the mix to the machine. Dashi
Frozen Mint Julep 2 scoops of mint sorbet 1 shot of Rebel Yell Put two scoops of mint sorbet in a rocks glass. Top with shot of Rebel Yell whiskey. Crook’s Corner
Tony Cross runs cocktail catering company, Reverie Cocktails, which distributes kegs of carbonated cocktails to bars, restaurants, and other venues. For more information, email him at reveriecocktails@outlook.com or visit reveriecocktails.com. barbizmag.com
June 2018
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Happenings July 2018
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July 19 National Daiquiri Day Many people only associate daiquiris with the frozen variety. Reacquaint them with the traditional trinity of rum, lime juice, and simple syrup.
July 14 Shark Awareness Day Throw on Jaws, arm your bartenders with shark facts, and stock up on blue curaçao for shark-themed cocktails like Shark Bite.
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July 1 International Joke Day Have your bartenders serve up cocktails today with the usual smile—and a joke.
If you need inspiration on how to incorporate ice cream into cocktails, or recipes for other frozen drinks, turn to page 10.
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July 18 National Hot Dog Day Grill up some hot dogs and offer a special like buy a beer, get a hot dog free.
June 2018 barbizmag.com
All Photos: Shutterstock.com.
July 15 National Ice Cream Day
Happenings
Upcoming
July 13 Friday the 13th
EVENTS
Craft a happy hour menu of appropriate cocktails like the Black Cat. Superstitious sippers beware!
JULY TRA Marketplace July 15-16, 2018 San Antonio, TX
tramarketplace.com
Tales of the cocktail July 27 National Scotch Day Queue up a menu of your favorites and give a nod to Scotland.
July 17-22, 2018 New Orleans, LA
talesofthecocktail.org
august western foodservice & hospitality expo August 19-21, 2018 Los Angeles, CA
westernfoodexpo.com
July 11 National Mojito Day Summer is the perfect time to celebrate this refreshing recipe. Add a twist by incorporating fruits like grapefruit, raspberry, or strawberry.
texas bar & night club convention August 27, 2018 San Antonio, TX
tbnaconvention.com
September florida restaurant & lodging show September 6-8, 2018 Orlando, FL
flrestaurantandlodgingshow.com
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July 25 Culinarians Day Celebrate your cooks! And then turn to page 18 and check out our article on kitchen equipment.
barbizmag.com
october foodservice technology tradeshow October 1-3, 2018 Orlando, FL
flrestaurantandlodgingshow.com
June 2018
Bar Business Magazine
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How To
How To: Kitchen Equipment
Four types of kitchen equipment to increase your efficiency.
Kitchen Innovations 18
Bar Business Magazine
By Emily Eckart June 2018 barbizmag.com
How To: Kitchen Equipment
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Blendtec Stealth 895 Nitro Blending System
Photo (left): Shutterstock/FXQuadro.
s your bar and kitchen equipment up to date? New equipment can increase your productivity and effectiveness behind the bar. Here’s a roundup of some exciting products from top brands. Perlick: Tobin Ellis Signature Cocktail Station This versatile cocktail station is perfect for a wide variety of bars and nightclubs. It was created through a collaboration with Perlick’s engineering team and Tobin Ellis, a six-time national bartending champion and bar designer. Dave Kearns, Product Marketing Manager at Perlick, says, “Tobin provided the kind of insight that can only come from someone who has made their living working behind a bar for many years. Tobin introduced some very novel concepts to the design process, which were directly related to solving specific design flaws he’s observed over the years and had lots of time to think about.” The result is a station that feels tailormade for the high-volume bartender. Designed with built-in amenities, the station stores all cocktail ingredients within easy reach—improving your bartender’s speed of service. It’s also designed to be ergonomic. Its ice chest is shallower front-to-back, which allows the bartender to stand closer to the bar, reducing reaching. It has a curved speed rail, creating a comfortable surface for the bartender to lean against. The emphasis on human-friendly design provides comfort for your staff, which in turn is good for business in the long run.
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“Improved ergonomics reduce muscle strain and repetitive motion injuries,” explains Kearns. Another special feature is the cocktail station’s unique refrigerated door. “Its primary purpose is to store cocktail garnishes, which include fresh fruit and herbs as well as fresh juices,” says Kearns. “Bars that feature very elaborate Bloody Marys love having a cold place to store all the fixings to keep them fresh.” The station offers varied purchasing options depending on your exact needs. Kearns says, “We offer preconfigured turnkey TE Signature Cocktail Stations, as well as modular options that are virtually limitless when combined with select custom pieces, such as corner fillers.” New improvements this year make the station even more powerful. “We’ve added a draft cocktail system to the Tobin Ellis Signature catalog of products,” says Kearns. “Now bartenders can have the best of both worlds: efficient production of one-at-a-time specialty craft cocktails, and the ability to serve a specialty house cocktail or samples in about ten seconds.” MEIKO: Undercounter Dishwashers With their fast, reliable washing and drying cycles, MEIKO’s undercounter dishwashers are perfect for bars. For bar owners, Mike Pavlovic, Senior Systems Planner at MEIKO, recommends undercounter models FV 40.2, FV 40.2 G, and M-iClean. MEIKO’s machines are quiet and easy to use, and they leave no chlorine residue. Their sleek, ergonomic design makes for an attractive surface if they are visible to your customers. Investing in a dishwasher is worthwhile, Pavlovic explains, because “hand-washing ware isn’t just time-consuming, it intensively consumes water, energy, and chemicals; leads to inconsistent results; and can increase breakage.” Automatic dishwashers and glasswashers solve these problems by offering rapid, consistent, and effective cleaning. High-temperature sanitization gets rid of the chlorine residue that can otherwise affect a beverage’s taste. As a result, you get consistently cleaned glasses for less of an effort, which pleases customers and benefits your bottom line.
MEIKO’s undercounter dishwashers feature innovative, laborsaving technologies that contribute to outstanding performance. “Every MEIKO undercounter dishwasher and glasswasher comes standard with an integral internal booster heater and a pumped final rinse for consistent results and water consumption,” says Pavlovic. “Likewise, MEIKO undercounters use a high-temperature sanitizing rinse for fast drying and no chlorine residue. Water consumption of the MEIKO range is the lowest in the industry, and all units carry the Energy Star mark.” MEIKO’s undercounter dishwashers have low water consumption, which means less of an impact when it comes to sewer, energy, and chemical usage. Furthermore, Pavlovic says, “MEIKO’s Active Plus dual filtration system reduces soil contamination of the wash water, which further reduces detergent use and its introduction into the drain system. The optional GiO Module for the M-iClean glasswasher further reduces detergent use by 50 percent, and rinse aid use by 90 percent.” The M-iClean model has an illuminated handle that allows staff to see the operating status of the machine (green for operation, blue for idle, or red for an important message). “A glass touchscreen, plain text graphical display provides intuitive operation and servicing,” says Pavlovic. “Items that should be removed daily for cleaning are accented in blue for fast and simple staff recognition and training. M-iClean also includes progressive energy savings modes if the machine is left idle. The longer the machine is idle, the more
Perlick Tobin Ellis Signature Cocktail Station June 2018
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How To: Kitchen Equipment
Meiko M-iClean Undercounter Glasswasher
heating energy is reduced, providing the ideal mix between quick recovery and energy savings.” The MEIKO M-iClean glasswasher’s optional GiO Module is a fully selfcontained reverse osmosis system that removes fine particulates from the incoming water. Pavlovic says, “This significantly reduces labor, eliminates the loss and hazards of broken wares during hand-polishing, and also eliminates possible re-contamination of sanitized ware that can occur with manual wiping.” Atlantic Coast Services: BarMax BarMax is a modular undercounter bar system with several distinctive features. It’s one of the many products offered by Atlantic Coast Services, a company headed by President Don Pittsley. “The story is we like to invent things,” says Raul Pineiro, who works in design and development for Atlantic Coast. Pineiro makes an effort to design bar systems based not on tradition, but on solving the challenges bartenders regularly face. For instance, BarMax’s countertops are higher than industry standard so that bartenders don’t have to bend down to make drinks. This makes it easier and more comfortable for the bartender to work. The stations also feature short legs to provide as much under counter storage space as possible. As Pineiro says, “In a bar, the most important real estate is space.” 20
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BarMax further capitalizes on space with its uniquely sized modules, which are designed based on the metric system (the catalog includes measurements in both millimeters and inches). The modules come in widths ranging from 400 to 1000 millimeters. As a result, Pineiro explains, “We can fit more modules into a space.” For example, the BarMax ice bin is 800 millimeters—approximately 32 inches. A typical ice bin is 36 inches. Over the length of the entire bar counter, those extra inches add up, allowing you to include more modules that serve different purposes in your setup. BarMax’s 22 different modules— which include workstations, ice bins, cabinets, glass racks, a blender station, and more—can be purchased separately, allowing bar owners great flexibility to suit the needs of an individual space. The units are easy to install and can be rearranged later if necessary. “The idea is to create a simple and flexible footprint, where bases and tops are interchangeable,” says Pineiro. Interchangeable bases and tops allow BarMax to offer a unique “bridge” system—an inexpensive solution for bar owners who might not have the funds to purchase several modules at once. Instead of purchasing three full modules, customers can purchase two modules and a standalone countertop that bridges between them, creating an uninterrupted countertop at lower cost. Bar owners can also request any other desired customizations to their BarMax modules. Other unique design features include a corner sink module, which provides a convenient solution for space that can otherwise be difficult to use. BarMax modules are constructed from 304 stainless steel so they can withstand outdoor exposure at the beach, as well. Blendtec: Stealth 895 Nitro Blending System Blendtec’s Stealth 895 Nitro Blending System (NBS) is a small, quiet blender that blends just one cup’s worth of ingredients. This jarless blender system saves time and prevents food waste. It features a small blade designed to fit inside the mouth of a standard 16, 20, or 24-ounce disposable plastic cup. The
bartender simply loads the cup, locks the blade attachment on top of the cup, flips it upside down, and lowers the sound enclosure lid over the cup to secure it in place on the blender base. “For safety reasons, the base only runs when the sound enclosure lid is closed,” says Chris Karanopoulos, Regional Sales Manager at Blendtec, who explains this safety feature prevents accidents. The Stealth 895 NBS allows for more flexibility and customization in making individual drinks. “It’s really beneficial for bars and beach locations,” explains Karanopoulos. The blender comes with a starter pack of cups, lids, and straws. Once you run out of those, it’s easy to buy new cups online or at any retail store. This blender is a timesaver. Because the plastic cup has far less volume than a typical blender jar, it forces ingredients to rotate over the blade more quickly, resulting in a quicker blend. “We can blend something in ten to twenty seconds, when it might take a little bit longer in a blender jar,” says Karanopoulos. It also saves on travel time, since the bartender can stand in one spot and continue to make different drinks in individual plastic cups, rather than traveling back and forth to the sink. The plastic cup system also avoids the cleanup required by a blender jar. As an added benefit, the Stealth 895 NBS prevents food waste. In a large blender jar, it’s easy to over-portion ingredients. The smaller plastic cup makes it simple to get measurements for an individual portion right.
Atlantic Coast Services’ BarMax Modular Undercounter Bar System
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Your Answer To Sangria On Tap What makes Jam’N Sangria so popular for restaurants? Simply put, this “Garnish and Go” sangria is a finished product and can be served right over ice with a simple fruit garnish! No more time consuming recipes, Just one consistent JAM’N sangria that can be dispensed through any pre-existing tap system or even through a soda gun! Jam’N Sangria comes in two flavor profiles, a Red Sangria - Simply delicious and refreshing this ruby red sangria is filled with aromas of fresh berry and citrus fruits! A juicy entry leads to a fruity, medium body of strawberry, apple, and orange flavors with a crisp clean finish! AND a White Sangria - Infused with fragrances of Peaches and Pears. A perfect balance of fruits with a crisp, yet sweet finish! Bottle format coming spring 2018
ONE WAY DISPOSABLE KEG CONVENIENCE
More Wine, Less Waste
No Corkscrew Needed
Reduce Storage Space
Always Fresh. Always Consistent.
More Choice Of Wine
100% Recyclable
Increased Revenue
Also Available: Hamptons Rosè Tasting Notes: Bright pink in color. The bouquet is characterized by red fruits. In the mouth a lively citrus and grapefruit give it an extra lift. Food Pairing: Pairs perfectly with duck confit, lobster roll, and oysters.
#vinetotap #cwdistributing #jamnsangria
www.cwdistributing.com For Inquiry’s Please Email orders@cwdistributing.com
Special Supplement
POS Trendsetters
Point-of-sale systems for the modern-day bar owner.
POS TRENDSETTER
Rezku POS Offers Advanced Features & Technology
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Enabling bar owners to become even more efficient at running their establishments.
hat separates you from other POS companies? Technology. 1) Our point-ofsale system is truly cloud-based. That means that you can access your data, change your menus, and manage inventory and labor from any device anywhere in the world. You never have to run to the office to view a report again. You can see how your bar is doing in real-time at any time right from your smartphone. In addition, because we are cloud-based, you never have to buy a POS server. Bar owners are often shocked that getting the latest technology is actually cheaper than trying to keep an old POS system working. 2) We have an industry-leading, offline mode built right into our POS that automatically turns itself on when the internet goes out and turns itself off when an internet connection is reestablished. This means if your internet goes out, you can still run your business, accept credit cards, and make money. I cannot tell you how many bar owners call us and praise this feature when their internet goes out. We had one bar owner whose entire downtown area lost internet, and he was the only bar open that night. I know he was very glad that he purchased our POS system. 3) Rezku POS is packed with security features that focus on preventing theft in your establishment. When an employee does something suspicious, our system automatically logs it and feeds that information to the bar owner. In addition, every person in the bar can have separate permissions. If you don’t trust an employee, you can actually stop him/ her from doing risky procedures.
sales with less labor, and he needs to keep track of every dime. Rezku POS allows bartenders to place orders at lightning speed. It also has a bar menu built right in to ensure that all of your cocktails are made right the first time. One of our customers has a Mexican restaurant with a very large bar, and his business was slammed for Cinco De Mayo. He said they are usually frantic playing catch up, but he was surprised at how smoothly everything went with Rezku POS. He was actually able to spend more time talking to the guests. He also said because the system is iPadbased, his staff loves how easy it is to use.
What challenges does the modernday bar owner face that your POS system can help solve? Today’s bar owner needs to do more
Have you observed any trends in the bar industry regarding the use of POS systems? We have seen a huge push towards
barbizmag.com
What additional features/plug-ins are available with the POS system? We integrate with the best-in-class bar software. Great companies like Bar Vision, Digital Pour, and Bar-i are fully integrated into Rezku POS, which allows bar owners to become even more efficient at running their establishments. Our system can also help bar owners with their marketing and promotions. Customer relationship management is a cornerstone of modern bar and restaurant ownership, and owners need to build lasting relationships and keep guests engaged by sending targeted ads and coupons or through customer loyalty programs—all of which can be handled through Rezku POS. The POS system also helps you determine the return on investment for your marketing efforts through the use of detailed sales reporting. When it comes to accessing and understanding data, Rezku POS has an incredibly easy-to-read dashboard with all the important information you’re looking for like average ticket/ tickets per hour, net sales/sales per hour, top sellers/sales by category, and labor to sales ratio.
iPad-based cloud systems. The iPad is one of the most secure devices around. Think about it, have you ever seen a virus on an iPad? It just doesn’t happen. And if you want a fast device, the iPad cannot be beat. It renders images fast and includes advanced predictive touch technology. June 30th is the deadline to meet the PCI Data Security Standard for safeguarding payment data. How is your company meeting this standard and safeguarding payment data? We want to be ahead of the curve on data security. We are fully PCI and EMV compliant with every major credit card processor. We have increased our security even further by offering EMV Level 3 encryption with every processor. A lot of bar owners don’t realize that they could get a pretty heavy PCI compliance fine for keeping customer’s credit cards at the bar. So we built EMV-compliant bar tabs into our POS system. The bartender can get the credit card from the patron, insert it into our EMV terminal, and give the card right back to the patron. This protects the bar owner from violating EMV compliance, and it also prevents patrons from skipping on their bar tabs.
Paul Katsch, CEO June 2018
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inventory management
has never
been easier
POS TRENDSETTER
Paradise POS Makes Bar Owners Rethink Tablets
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Proving the robust capabilities and functionalities of a tablet-based system.
hat separates you from other POS companies? Our technology and our partners. Paradise POS was developed to be a true replacement to a traditional POS system while utilizing the affordability of a tablet. The old traditional systems are being replaced and tablets are the wave of the future. The problem has always been that tablet systems were seen as inferior to traditional systems in functionality. The reason for this perception is too many tablet-based systems were launched before they were ready in a rush to be early to market. Things like table diagrams, unlimited modifiers, split checks, inventory management, etc. were left out. There are even systems on the market that don’t have a time clock, much less full labor reports! At that point, aren’t you really just using electronic cash registers? Tablets have far more computing power than most legacy systems. We have a product that a customer can use to operate a fast-paced bar with as many stations as they need at an affordable tablet pricepoint. Our partners have helped us make the system a better product for users. Groups like Redfin POS and PayProTec with their Saltsha Prime program have ensured users are happy and that we continue to develop the system into what bar and restaurant owners really want. What challenges does the modernday bar owner face that your POS system can help solve? Bar owners are facing rising wages and increased competition for top talent, making it an uphill battle to control labor costs. It’s essential to have the capability to digitally manage your employees. Hyper vigilance and constant monitoring so that you know where your larger labor costs are coming from is key to controlling them. Paradise POS has robust reporting that you can access from your phone or laptop when you can’t be in the bar. Beyond the power of the system, we have employee menu templates to give fast access to the barbizmag.com
most-used options. We pre-auth cards EMV or swipe to open bar tabs or offer a quick pay ticket for fast sales. When a tab is opened, we capture the name for quick reference. We highlight open tabs in blue and have a search by name feature. We have options to add tax at time of closeout or include it in the price. What additional features/plug-ins are available with the POS system? One feature we’ve seen increasing in popularity is our ability to run cash discount programs on the POS. They’re a great way for bar owners to recover some of their expenses. We also offer our liquor inventory management system for free to Paradise users. It runs as a separate application called Coconut that interacts with the POS. We utilize a scale to weigh bottles to convert counts into ounces, bottles, etc. This gives the bar owner a much more accurate picture than other systems on the market. We also offer an online portal allowing the owner/manager to track what is happening in their bar from anywhere they have internet. We’re not big on integrating to third-party apps because we believe it nickel and dimes a customer to death. Instead, we prefer to develop the product organically and add features to the POS included in our standard offering with no additional fees. Have you observed any trends in the bar industry regarding the use of POS systems? I believe all systems will be tablet-based in the next few years. Even traditional legacy providers have invested tons of time and money in attempting to move to tablets. Unfortunately, when you do this, the system is still designed for a traditional station, so you lose some of the functionality of the tablet. One of the challenges for tablets, other than those I mentioned earlier, is that they almost exclusively require a server in the cloud. If you lose your internet connection, you lose the functionality of your system. Providers will advertise that they have an offline mode, but station 1 won’t communicate to station 3, you can’t
print to the kitchen, etc. With Paradise POS, if your internet connection is lost, our stations communicate locally over your network so you can still run your business. June 30th is the deadline to meet the PCI Data Security Standard for safeguarding payment data. How is your company safeguarding data? Paradise POS utilizes a semi-integrated solution to Pax, Dejavoo, Castles, and Inegnico devices and combines them with compliant gateway partners such as USAePay and Paygistix to avoid ever touching payment data. You pull up the ticket, hit pay, select credit, and we make a call to the terminal sitting at the station to tell it the proper amount to charge. You swipe/dip your card, and the terminal returns a response to us telling us the card is good. We have a background in payments of more than a decade. When we developed the system, we had a strong understanding of credit card data and PCI. You rarely hear of a breach to a terminal; they’re almost always within the POS system. We eliminate this risk by never touching the data. You can still adjust transactions, hold cards, lookup transactions, etc. just as you would on any traditional system. Paradise POS has accepted EMV cards since well before the EMV liability shift because we didn’t have to rework our payment module to do it like many other systems. We just wrote an integration to the latest and greatest terminals in the market. When the next big thing comes out, we’ll add the integration.
Jeh Holsomback, President June 2018
Bar Business Magazine
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PLEASE DON’T TOUCH.
Speed. Control. Profit. THE BAR, RESTAURANT & NIGHTCLUB INDUSTRY’S POS SYSTEM 82 Saint Paul Street Floor 1 Rochester, New York 14604-1311
Phone: (888) 756-7994 Ext 1 Email: Info@2TouchPOS.com
www.2touchpos.com
POS TRENDSETTER
2TouchPOS Offers Bar & Restaurant-Focused system
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Focused on being the best at the front-of-the-house.
hat separates you from other POS companies? It’s our vision that sets us apart. Our vision about the software we sell and the customers we serve. To us, the point-of-sale system is just that—a “sales” system. It doesn’t do inventory or accounting or payroll. The POS does, however, have data these other business systems need. So, we concentrate on the front-of-the-house and all the little details that make it run more effectively and profitably. We capture all the data the inventory, accounting, and payroll folks need. We make it easy for them to get at that data while keeping the bar owners’ network secure. We leave the other business processes to vendors who concentrate on those business functions. We concentrate on being the best in the world at the front-of-thehouse. We also focus on fit. Meaning the customers we serve are only bars, restaurants, and nightclubs. We don’t focus on quick-serve, and we don’t focus on pizza. If you are a bar, restaurant, or nightclub, we have just what you need. What are the benefits of a POS system solely dedicated to the frontof-the-house and the bar and restaurant industry? The front-of-the-house is a fast-paced, action-packed place to work. Our customer’s patrons are known for making special requests. They ask the servers and bartenders for all sorts of things: “Hold the mustard. Extra cheese on half. Can I split this check three ways except for the bottle of wine? I know I started my tab with that card, but can I actually pay with this one?” It takes precision and communication to get all these requests right. It’s the POS system that manages those requests. We put the front-of-the-house under a microscope and develop features barbizmag.com
that benefit the establishment and enable it to run better, smoother, and friction free for greater customer satisfaction. The front-of-the-house is where it all happens for the patrons. The back-of-the-house is there to support the front-of-the-house and in order to get that support, the front-ofthe-house needs to make sure it “reports in” after close at the end of the day. That’s where our cloud services kick in. Tell our readers more about your cloud services and DataKey. Our Cloud Services pack all the business day’s ticket details and time clock entries from 2TouchPOS and publishes the data to Amazon Cloud servers. Our DataKey makes all those details available via APIs, Web Services, and OData Feeds. Now the back-of-the-house, through automation, can receive updates on all the key details through best-of-breed inventory systems, accounting systems, payroll systems, and so on. The newfound timeliness, accuracy, and completeness of sales performance information provides insight to decision making. That is how you get overall improvement in the front-ofthe-house—through the cloud, access your data with Microsoft Office and analyze your business to your heart’s content.
requirements that the card brands demand. What additional features/plug-ins are available with the POS system? • Cloud Services – Odata Feed enables access to data with Microsoft Office • Cash Tax Discount – Eliminate use of pennies, nickels and dimes • Inventory Integration – Easy Bar, AccuBar, TavernTrak • Accounting Integration – Compeat, RSI, Restaurant 365 • DashBoards – Customer insights Have you observed any trends in the bar industry regarding the use of POS systems? I see a trend of bar owners looking for integrations of the POS to other applications. June 30th is the deadline to meet the PCI Data Security Standard for safeguarding payment data. How is your company meeting this standard and safeguarding data? 2TouchPOS Version 4 was released February 2016. It is out of scope and using P2PE readers. It’s the most secure version of 2TouchPOS to date.
What challenges does the modernday bar owner face that your POS system can help solve? Right now one of the key challenges bar owners face is the wave of change being thrust on them with regard to payment systems—from chip cards to encryption and now new Mastercards that start with the number two. Keeping their payment systems operational and the expense down is a key challenge. 2TouchPOS offers an innovative, up-to-date, out-of-scope payment solution that meets the security
Eric Elwell, CEO June 2018
Bar Business Magazine
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POS TRENDSETTER
Shift4 Payments Offers Four POS systems Serving up the robust functionality, innovative tools, and secure payment processing bar owners demand.
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hat separates you from other POS companies? What’s unique about Shift4 Payments is that we don’t just offer a single POS system, but we provide a choice between four industry-leading solutions specifically developed for bars and restaurants. Our Harbortouch, Future POS, POSitouch, and Restaurant Manager POS systems all feature robust functionality, innovative tools, and powerful back-end capabilities, while providing different features and interfaces unique to each software type. Each software option is offered on our powerful hardware that includes a lifetime warranty, and each of these best-in-class solutions are available at an unbeatable price point. We have also received the endorsement of Jon Taffer, Host and Executive Producer of the hit TV show Bar Rescue. Taffer is more than a television personality—he has been a leading business consultant in the hospitality industry for over three decades with numerous business awards and accolades to his name. In addition to this endorsement, Shift4’s POS systems have integrated unique “Smart POS” tools developed by Jon Taffer, including powerful analytics and customer promotions, that will have a direct impact on top-line sales by increasing both customer frequency and spend per visit. What challenges does the modernday bar owner face that your POS system can help solve? Running a bar in today’s constantly changing business landscape is no easy task. Consumer preferences are continually evolving while new technologies are being introduced every day that can impact a bar’s business operations. Our POS systems include a wide range of features to help business barbizmag.com
owners leverage these trends to improve customer experience and increase sales. This includes customer loyalty programs, mobile technology integrations, online ordering, and more. In addition to these trends, emerging payment methods have altered the transaction process for many businesses. Shift4 Payments has been on the forefront of new payment technology such as EMV, NFC, and other mobile payment methods as well as tokenization and more to make sure you are able to accept payment in any form that your customers prefer. June 30th is the deadline to meet the PCI Data Security Standard for safeguarding payment data. How is your company meeting this standard and safeguarding data? Shift4 Payments prides itself on our truly ironclad security technology that protects businesses from costly data breaches and ensures compliance with PCI standards. Shift4 Payments offers the “security trifecta” with PCI-validated Point-toPoint Encryption (P2PE), TrueTokenization, and cutting-edge EMV technology. Our PCI-validated P2PE technology prevents card data from entering our customers’ POS environment—keeping the POS system out of PCI scope. The notable distinction of being PCI-validated not only creates a more secure POS solution, but also greatly reduces the burdens and costs associated with PCI compliance by eliminating or relaxing a number of requirements. This is combined with our unique tokenization solution, which replaces sensitive cardholder data with a random alphanumeric value for maximum security. Have you observed any trends in the bar industry regarding the use of POS systems? A few years ago, there was a lot of
interest in tablet-based POS systems, but we have seen this trend reverse over the last year or two as many of the early adopters have now realized that tablet solutions are not well suited to a bar environment. Since tablets are consumer devices, they are typically underpowered for business operations and are simply not built to withstand the rigors of a bar or restaurant where they are exposed to dust, steam, smoke, high heat, grease, and other spills. Built-for-purpose equipment is more reliable and provides a better experience for both staff and customers. In addition to the hardware advantages provided by traditional POS solutions, the software is also typically more robust, with powerful back-end functionality that is often not available on tabletbased apps. Lastly, the customer support offered by most tablet POS companies is very minimal and is often only offered via email. This lack of support can be very detrimental when a bar experiences an issue on a busy night that disrupts their business operations. On the other hand, traditional POS systems are typically supported by local POS dealers, and Shift4 Payments offers 24/7 phone support on top of that local service, so this offers a lot of peace of mind for bar owners.
Joe Messina, EVP, Sales June 2018
Bar Business Magazine
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TM
Meet a Smarter Point-of-Sale Solution. VeeaPOS is an integrated all-in-one POS platform that offers a comprehensive range of capabilities including unique forms of payments to customer communications and engagements. Customizable to your needs.
User Access permissions & staff management.
Support for moving and splitting checks.
Customer self check-out with integrated tab support.
Pre-authorization support for credit and debit cards.
Cash drawer management & other hardware support.
Menu management with daily special and happy hour support.
Detailed customer & sales reporting.
Table-side ordering support.
Mobile POS hardware.
.. and then meet the rest of the family. Leverage the powerful Veea Platform to minimize costs and reach your customers like never before. Create unique customer experiences with supported applications for bars.
The little box that can. Provide great in-store experiences to your customers and staff with an easy-to-use Smart Hub.
Go places. Veea is our app for your customers - it allows customers to interact with your business when you use our platform.
Your business in your hands. Manage your business, connect with your customers, create promotions, deals and queues and more, all in one app.
Payments made better. VeeaPay is your anywhere, anytime, smartphone-ready way to safely and securely accept card swipes, taps and dips.
• Deliver live sports, music and digital games to TVs and tablets. • Provide guest Wi-Fi and secure employee messaging. • Push targeted advertisements to your customers. ... and so much more!
• Get real-time feedback from your customers. • Push targeted promotions and deals. • Get discovered and see when customers are considering your bar. ... and so much more!
• Create deals, promotions and coupons. • Alert your customers about upcoming events. • Manage queues and reservations with ease. ... and so much more!
• Only 2.65% per swipe, dip and tap with no hidden fees. • All major credit and debit cards accepted. • Merchant portal to track sales, deposits, and more. ... and so much more!
Interested in how VeeaPOS and the Veea platform can help your bar? For more information, including special offers, please visit us at veea.com
POS TRENDSETTER
Introducing Veea’s Smart Bar Technologies
T
Delivering streamlined operations, responsive hospitality, and maximum excitement to your patrons.
ell our readers about Veea. Today, we are all surrounded by many things that are called Smart that are enabled by more computing capabilities than ever before. Nearly everyone has a smartphone, some have smart homes, which are connected to smart grids. Smart objects range from watches, thermostats, medicines to even liquor bottles such as Johnnie Walker’s launch of interactive bottles just last year. Veea believes that in an ever-more connected world, Smart technologies can make it much easier for bar owners and managers to effortlessly focus on their daily operations and customer engagements. At the same time, bar venue customer services such as reliable and secure guest WiFi along with personalized digital services are not only appreciated but now expected. Veea Inc. (“Veea”) is a platform company with a suite of innovative products and services for Smart applications including Smart hospitality solutions. The Veea platform offers the perfect all-in-one solution at much lower costs than any combination of products and services offered to the bar and restaurant owners by multiple vendors. Through this fully integrated platform of mobile apps, POS, payments, and networking solutions, there’s a new way for bar owners to seamlessly run their business, reach their customers, and accept payments through the app, at the table, or behind the bar. All components of this platform are also offered on a standalone basis.
Highlights • Mobile and fixed tablet-based POS & tableside ordering • Advanced POS features for bars • Pocket-sized portable vCube payment terminal with built-in beacon—dip, tap, or swipe at the table or bar • Customer self check-out of tab with a digital payment feature integrated with POS • VeeaPay’s simple set-up & onboarding • Live customer support
What do VeeaPOS & VeeaPay offer? VeeaPOS and VeeaPay is a Point of Sale (POS) solution with a unique payment application and wide range of value-added services. VeeaPay payment services is provided through a first-of-a-kind portable handheld mPOS payment terminal with a built-in beacon that supports all major credit cards and methods of payments— contact, contactless, and cardless CNP payments such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay, Alipay, and WeChat Pay—at highly competitive rates.
Highlights • Be discovered by in-town or out-oftown visitors • Staff & customer messaging • Discover potential customers and make offers to Veea consumer app users • Reservations and virtual waitlists • Guest rewards in or away from the bar
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What are the Veea consumer app and VeeaConnect merchant app? The Veea consumer app and VeeaConnect merchant app (for iOS and Android devices) is an end-to-end solution unlike any other mobile app platform in the marketplace. On the consumer side, customers are better able to manage their dining or bar experiences through features that allow them to find and rate venues; easily invite multiple parties to join them for an outing based on best offers at the most convenient times and locations voted by the group; and even be added to a virtual waitlist. Through VeeaConnect, bar owners are able to engage and retain customers while running their businesses more efficiently. Features include a dynamic real-time business profile, the ability to reach out to patrons and offer promotions, and hyper-local and social commerce marketing that augment the real world with seamless in- and out-ofstore experiences that can be further supercharged through data analytics supported by machine learning and AI.
How can bars benefit from VeeaHub? VeeaHub was designed with restaurant and bar owners in mind, who currently have to use multiple service providers and suppliers
for a range of services that add up to significant costs. VeeaHub converges those requirements into a single source—whether its running and managing a POS, music, and video streaming applications, monitoring the refrigeration system or other appliances either from inside the venue or remotely, and many more. VeeaHub offers a ton of feature functionality, including support for the most advanced implementation of commonly used wireless communications protocols such as WiFi, Bluetooth with Eddystone beacon, Internet of Things (IoT) sensor communications, and optional 4G backhaul with automatic failover for ISP connection. This allows bar owners to set up services like free guest WiFi for their customers and private WiFi for their staff with multiple SSIDs. VeeaHub’s powerful embedded server can run software applications at business locations and/or in the Cloud, and it offers true end-to-end management. Popular Applications for Bars & Clubs • Social jukebox with voting • Digital signage for every screen • Monitor venue activities & track staff with security cameras & video analytics • Multi-site private video staff training • Security applications • IoT firewall • Game nights • Ad revenue opportunities for bar and restaurant owners with streaming or cached content
Allen Salmasi, CEO June 2018
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BAR BUSINESS MAGAZINE provides nightclub and bar owners, operators, and managers the chance to find out what is going on in the industry, and more importantly, how to benefit from it all. Each issue includes our signature “how-to” columns with detailed, step-by-step instructions on various ways to improve your business through aesthetic alterations, managerial practices, marketing strategies, and more.
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How To
How To: inventory control
Taking Stock of Your Stock What you don’t know may mean lost profits and missed opportunities.
Photo: Bar-i.
Y
ou know the old saying, “you’ve got nothing to lose and everything to gain?” That’s not quite true if you are a bar owner or manager. Even if you happen to be running one of the hottest bars in your city, your bread and butter is what you are stocking to bring your concept to life. However, there are forces at work that may compromise everything you’ve worked for.
Pro Tip The increased complexity of bar operations necessitate more high-tech ways to track a bar’s liquid assets as well as the activities of staffers handling them. barbizmag.com
By Elyse Glickman Inventory is also one of those things where one size will not fit all. This is why companies such as Partender, Bar-i, and Sculpture Hospitality offer different services and approaches to managing spirits and other raw materials that power cocktail menus and bar concepts. Assessing Your Inventory Goals and Avoiding Downpours With the pressure to keep overall operating costs down, it can be tempting to go the inventory process alone or stick to what worked well in the past. However, the increased complexity of bar operations—triggered by an evergrowing range of spirits, beer, and wine—necessitate more high-tech ways to track the in’s and out’s of a bar’s liquid assets as well as the activities of staffers handling them. “I see people moving past pen, paper, and clipboards, and while old ways still have their place, new approaches have to be factored in to keep their business
current across the board, especially as bad data in equals bad data out,” says Anjali Kundra, Co-Founder and Vice President of Operations at Partender. “With point-of-sale data alone, you’re not factoring in the hard work involved in getting a cocktail together. If one only pays attention to the bottom line to determine they are not in the red, they can lose out on the potential revenue.” Inventory services are sometimes marketed as a theft deterrent, but Kundra feels inventory tracking should be less about policing staff and more about empowering them with knowledge about what’s in stock—enabling them to take responsibility for a bar’s success. “I recently learned at a conference that the turnover rate at bars was something like 70%,” she says. “We are hoping the transparency element of our products and services can instead be used to improve morale and employee culture for clients. Ultimately, the goal is to provide insights and real data that can help bar owners, June 2018
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How To: inventory control
managers, and team members address problems, move forward with smarter sales and inventory control strategies, and end up enjoying their jobs more.” Kundra observes that her corporate clients may only do inventory once a month to report numbers and findings back to their bosses. Smaller clients need to do it more often not only to ensure that their beverage costs check out against their profits, but also to aid in menu planning and recipe development based on products that are moving fastest. “In addition to having better control over the inventory, when you have greater control over what goes in and goes out, you can attain better transparency among your staff in terms of what’s poured and sold and target costs for operations,” says Kundra. “I would like to see clients thinking more holistically about their inventory and picking companies or product based on their specific needs and goals rather than just for price alone.” Jamie Edwards, Founder of Bar-i in 24
Bar Business Magazine
Colorado, notes that the bar industry is highly competitive and low margin precisely because of the discrepancy between what bartenders should theoretically pour for a given recipe and what they actually pour during their shift. “While data we’ve collected for clients tell us bars lose a lot of money from not keeping track of their liquid assets, the same data also stresses that they can cut those losses by establishing better practices to stop overpouring and other kinds of waste,” says Edwards. “One way to [get on top of the waste issue] is to apply our software solutions to pinpoint where the shortages and overpours are and how to fix them. You need to have those costs figured out right down to the serving in an individual drink.” In terms of picking the best service, Ian Foster, Sculpture Hospitality’s Regional Director in California, says owners and managers need to also be clear on which services will fit an individual bar’s immediate needs and how those services down the road can
When Less is More Edwards, meanwhile, advises his clients to evaluate their product selection on a regular basis. As customers become more selective about the products they consume, bar buyers and managers should become just as picky. “A huge mistake bars make is just adding more and more,” he says. “If you want greater profits, you need to be clever about the way you approach what to add and when. The best run bars I have seen stock fewer products but have team members with greater knowledge about those products. Owners can also use the strategy of trying out new products for three months, see what works, and then rotate them. We found that a menu with only six well-crafted well drinks is way better than an expansive list of over 30 cocktails.” Foster, meanwhile, affirms that changes in customer drinking habits taking place in the past 25 years will impact what products should be selected and how much of them should be kept in inventory.
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Photo: Sculpture Hospitality.
Inventory control not only aids in controlling losses but also menu planning.
be adjusted as those needs change. “If the goal is simply to do monthly inventory faster and better, there are many competitors offering apps that improve the efficiency of the inventory process,” says Foster. “If you are trying to find out if a spirit is being overpoured or not rung up correctly, however, you’ll find there are not many companies with our hands-on approach to set up your inventory system to ensure the numbers will be accurate. The majority of our clients (90%) have us do a full-service inventory as they are confident that we can accurately count, weigh, and catch more mistakes as we do these things everyday. We aim to provide results that will enable clients to take the best course of action in staving off loss, identifying related management problems, and providing recommendations to solve them.” Foster also points out that when owners price drinks, they look at the cost of the drinks and mark it up accordingly. While this system works well, there are products you should be charging more for, such as a drink made with a quality vodka, especially if the brand is perceived by customers as premium.
How To: inventory control
From the Paper Trail to the Tech Superhighway Foster, a 40-year industry veteran, recalls that 25 years ago, nobody wanted to do inventory themselves. However, as technologies have gotten better and new apps are coming out, customers have greater incentive to keep track of stock between professional assessments. He 26
Bar Business Magazine
points out that specific technologies, such as draft flow meters for tracking draft craft beer, have improved dramatically. He cites “BevCheck,” which shows clients in real time how much beer is being poured and what’s being rung up,. He says it has results that can be guaranteed and mechanisms that can be recalibrated when necessary. “Today, some clients want to do the inventory themselves or at least have a hand in the process, so we now offer that option in some of our packages,” he says. “For example, we have an app that works on a smartphone with a scanner that allows clients to scan [information from] bottles. We have also expanded our product range to allow the client to do some of the work or even do all of the data entry themselves, and they pay a little less for that.” According to Bar-i’s Edwards, some clients want to do more things independently when managing their business. In response, his firm launched an entry-level pay software product where the owner or staffer can fill out the forms on their own. When clients are ready to upgrade to a higher functioning software, their costs will still be reduced as they have done much of the work of entering their inventory into the entrylevel software that will be transferred to a more advanced program. The advanced program can handle more of the complexity in bar operations, like batched cocktails. “We have now hit a
place in the craft cocktail movement where bars pre-batch their cocktails especially in high-volume sales situations,” says Edwards. “We built this module into the software, which helps single out the costs of the various components on a large scale. It is adaptable for infused and batched drinks, no matter what kind of vessel, and still produces precise costs down to an individual drink.” Kundra says she still encounters clients who may be hesitant to use newer inventory methods, but this fear comes as the cost of lost time. “What we want to deliver through our products is the time for clients to use information about their inventory and the sales trends related to it to make better decisions that will impact the front of the bar, and keep them front and center,” says Kundra. “Others [who shy away from newer approaches] count the pennies, but it is at the expense of what’s on the shelves.” Edwards sums up today’s inventory programs and services as the “ultimate analytics tools” to adapt to whatever changes are afoot in the industry in days or hours rather than weeks or months. Still, the focus should remain on control versus catering to trends. “Every bar sells alcohol by the serving,” he says. “To get those costs under control, owners and managers need to look at why they may be selling more alcohol per serving than they should. You want to stay up to date, but you don’t want to focus so much on what’s hot and shiny at the expense of long-term success.”
The liquid assets on a bar’s shelves account for thousands of dollars invested in a business.
June 2018 barbizmag.com
Photo: Sculpture Hospitality.
However, stocking higher quality products can shift the costs to customers. “Bar customers overall are drinking less, some because of drinking-anddriving concerns,” says Foster. “However, they may not necessarily spend less money when they go out. If an average person goes out with $30 to spend, chances are he will spend much of that $30.” Foster explains that customers will buy less but spend more on quality craft beers or craft cocktails. Foster adds that bars carry more wines and beers than they used to, and those cost more per serving. He has also had clients who have offered more by-theglass wine offerings than they really need for their bar format, as a bottle needs to be dumped after it has been sitting around for four or five days. “We tell our clients that if they are not selling the full bottle of a given wine within a few days, they should remove it from their by-the-glass program,” he says. “We instead suggest kegged wines as there is less risk of waste. “We stay up on those trends because we are inside thousands of bars every day of the week doing inventory, and we get to see what every client does and what things sell best in different parts of the country, markets, and genres of bars, and from this, we can devise what the best practices are.” “Bar owners and managers need to recognize that the register will count every single sip,” assesses Kundra. “While you may have a few hundred dollars in the register, those liquid assets you are putting on your shelves account for thousands of dollars you’ve invested in your businesses, and sometimes it’s challenging to count those assets because the process takes so long to do. You also have to consider that the bottles and casks making up those assets have a wholesale and retail value.”
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How To: inventory control
Texas Bar Goes Big with Inventory Control Sculpture Hospitality, a pioneer in the inventory control business, has helped thousands of bars and restaurants across the globe over the past 30 years. They see that problems with loss and lower efficiencies plague the industry. Without accurate data, it’s impossible to find the cause of lower efficiency, so their teams conduct a series of Discovery Audits with new clients where they are able to garner an exact snapshot of how a bar is performing—down to the drop! That data and guidance is proving to be quite valuable to bars. Dallas, Texas Sculpture Hospitality franchisee, Tim Huels, notes that his business is up 40% over last year with most of that growth coming from existing clients opening new locations as well as referrals from clients who have had Sculpture Hospitality’s systems not only improve their margins, but also their quality of life. Huels says his ideal client is someone looking to expand but that needs a better system to monitor performance and set a higher standard. Charles Houk, Owner of Southern Junction Nightclub & Steakhouse, is one of those clients. Southern Junction Nightclub & Steakhouse opened in Royse City, Texas in 1985, and Houk bought the business in 2008. The country/western venue has a love for everything Texas— big venue, big meal, big dance floor, and big names, including Garth Brooks, Merle Haggard, and Charlie Daniels! When Houk took over Southern Junction, he came from the world of banking with no back-of-the-house experience. “I knew inventory was important, but it took me a full eighthour day to count, and I wasn’t even sure if I was doing it right,” he says. “I was counting everything in-house and trying hard to compare it to sales, but it was all guesswork. It may have been close on bottled beer and wine, but it was far from exact. Liquor was a total mystery. I had no idea how to account for specials, doubles, and recipes.” Enter Sculpture Hospitality’s Bevinco bar inventory service. Houk had seen the product in action on the TV show Bar Rescue but didn’t realize he could have a local Franchisee meet him at his bar and get the data he’s always wanted in less than two weeks. Today, Houk uses Bevinco for loss prevention, inventory management, 28
Bar Business Magazine
ordering, training, and advice. Loss prevention. “Just the fact that alcohol is counted weekly and reconciled with sales reports is huge in keeping bar staff on point,” says Houk. “The continuous feedback helps us remind them that we are watching closely. The one thing I didn’t expect is the pride that bartenders take in keeping the variances low, efficiency high, and that they police themselves to keep it that way.” Houk says the reports also convinced him to fire a bartender he believed was stealing. “I suspected him of stealing but couldn’t figure out what he was doing. But the reports convinced me, and I let him go,” says Houk. “Firing a guy who was stealing, combined with the ripple effect among other employees who suddenly realized we were serious, had
Anyone serving alcohol needs to have these controls in place for their liquor, wine, and beer to be successful.
—Jon Taffer
Tim Huels & Charles Houk
a huge positive effect on the business.” Inventory Control. When Houk first started using Bevinco, he quickly realized that he kept too much product in-house. “Reducing inventory to what we actually use in a week does two things: keeps cash in the bank and also provides less opportunities for bottles to grow legs,” he says. Ordering. “Ordering now takes ten minutes when using the iPar report order guide instead of an hour,” says Houk. Training. Southern Junction’s team uses weekly awareness to improve training systems that enhance their guest experience. “Training is made easier because we all now know the exact standards that are being measured,” says Houk. Advice. “I regularly call Tim and ask how I should read this or that number, whether it makes sense to implement a procedure, or if things just aren’t making sense with the reports,” says Houk. “We can almost always figure out what direction we need to go in these areas, and his advice is always welcome.” With Bevinco, Southern Junction’s liquor cost reduced by over four points, and they reduced their amount of inventory on hand by 27%. During the discovery audit, Southern Junction was losing $1,040 at cost. If just half of the venue’s losses were calculated at cost, he’d increase his revenue by over $3,300 per week, which equals $171,600 per year! The increased efficiency from using Bevinco helped enable Southern Junction to open an even bigger second location in Irving, Texas. “When I heard about Charles’ experience with Bevinco in Dallas, I wasn’t surprised in the least that they were able to open a second location simply because they were using the Bevinco service,” says Jon Taffer, Host of Bar Rescue. “Anyone serving alcohol needs to have these controls in place for their liquor, wine, and beer—so stop with the excuses and call Bevinco.” When opening the second location, Houk’s first phone call was to Huels. “He helped with opening inventory, training, and getting started out on the right foot,” says Houk. “That helped set the culture on the front-end instead of having to correct it over time.” sculpturehospitality.com/barbizmag
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shift4
shifting
gears
The new Shift4 Payments simplifies and integrates POS systems and payment processing. 30
Bar Business Magazine
I
n the hospitality industry, the world of payment processing and POS systems has seen quite a few changes recently. Nowhere has this been more apparent than with Shift4 Payments, which underwent a recent series of acquisitions. For starters, the company acquired three additional POS companies that will operate alongside Shift4 Payments’ own long-standing POS offering,
Harbortouch: Future POS, Restaurant Manager, and POSitouch. These acquisitions allow them to serve larger bars and restaurants that operate in a more complex environment. “We have a great appreciation for the food and beverage environment, and we have a great appreciation for the value a sophisticated dealer can bring to the table in terms of servicing and supporting this complex environment,”
June 2018 barbizmag.com
shift4 leader in secure payment processing solutions, serving tens of thousands of clients across North America. The organization, formerly known as Lighthouse Network, was rebranded into Shift4 Payments. Shift4 will now power the payment processing services for Harbortouch, Future POS, Restaurant Manager, and POSitouch. “It’s been a busy year for us,” says Shift4 Payments CEO Jared Isaacman. “And the final piece of it was Shift4. We wanted to bring in-house the actual payment processing technology and connectivity into the card brands.” So why is all of this important to bar and restaurant owners? “Because we’re substantially enhancing the value proposition,” says Isaacman. By acquiring POS companies and their hardware and software, as well as the payment processing capabilities of Shift4, the organization has simplified and streamlined the payment processing and POS offerings for the bar and restaurant vertical, which traditionally have been fragmented, expensive, and not well integrated. Now, instead of having to deal with multiple vendors for the POS hardware and software, gateway for PCI-validated encryptions, payment processing system, etc., a bar owner has the option to deal with just one company. “The acquisitions we’ve done allowed us to vertically integrate so many components of the POS and payment processing experience. Ultimately, it’s to the benefit of the bar or restaurant owner because they’re getting a far lower cost solution, they’re getting all the things that matter when it comes to security like point-to-point encryption and tokenization, they’re getting their payment processing, and they have one phone number, essentially, to call for service and support,” says Isaacman. “The value proposition has only been enhanced
by assembling all these pieces and having them fit together in a really harmonious way.” The capabilities and features Shift4 brings to the table have also enhanced that value proposition. When looking for a payment processing company, Isaacman knew he needed a robust, enterprise-grade platform that could handle secure payment processing in the unique hospitality market, which is a very demanding environment characterized by transactions that are constantly being adjusted with the addition of tips, upsold items, drink orders, etc. “You can’t just go and buy any gateway or any technology platform because if they haven’t made the investments over the years to optimize for that demanding food/beverage/ hospitality environment, you’re not going to be able to properly serve that environment,” says Isaacman. “Shift4, as a platform, has been optimized for that demanding environment for a long time. Over $70 billion a year in payment volume goes to the Shift4 platform, and it’s been that way for thirty years—so it’s very tried, true, proven, and reliable.” Shift4 is also one of the few PCIvalidated point-to-point encrypted gateways. “There are a number of gateway platforms out there that offer point-to-point encryption, but only a select number are actually PCI validated,” says Isaacman. “That makes a huge difference because a merchant who’s on a normal point-to-point encrypted gateway does not eliminate a lot of the PCI compliance-related costs and obligations. But on a PCI-validated one it does—it provides a ton of exemptions to the merchant.” This dramatically reduces the responsibility on the bar owner and is especially important in ensuring compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI
We’re substantially enhancing the value proposition.
All Photos: Shift4 Payments.
By Ashley Bray
says Jared Isaacman, CEO of Shift4 Payments. “We want to appeal to all segments of the food and beverage vertical—not just the SMB, small end of the scale—and we now cover the entirety of the spectrum because of our acquisitions.” At the start of the year, the company also acquired Shift4 Corporation, provider of the world’s largest independent payment gateway and the barbizmag.com
June 2018
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shift4
Shift4 is one of the few PCI-validated point-to-point encrypted gateways.
DSS), which is a set of security standards designed to ensure that all companies that accept, process, store, or transmit credit card information maintain a secure environment. “It should inspire confidence in merchants that as long as everything is configured properly, you are essentially in a near breach-proof environment because you’re talking about the highest validated levels of encryption taking place from the time that the transaction is read all the way through the processing life cycles,” says Isaacman. Shift4 also provides the security feature of tokenization. In fact, Shift4 coined the term “tokenization” in 2005 and outlined the most secure way to protect data at rest, called TrueTokenization®. TrueTokenization means that their tokens are not mathematically derived, predictable, sequential, or have any one-to-one relationship with the credit card number. “You can do a lot with tokenization so there are a number of features and functionalities, reporting, analytics, business intelligence, social media, and reputation management capabilities—all these things are being built out at the Shift4 level right now, some of which is already available,” says Isaacman. “So there is going to be a wealth of functionality that is being made available to all customers—whether its Harbortouch, Future POS, POSitouch, or Restaurant Manager—when they’re connected into the gateway.” Any user of the POS brands under Shift4 Payments will have access to Shift4 capabilities. Harbortouch users will all be migrating over to the Shift4 platform at no extra cost. However, Future POS, POSitouch, and Restaurant Manager 32
Bar Business Magazine
June 2018 barbizmag.com
shift4 supported a variety of different payment processors, and those users will have the option to stay with their current processor or to move over to Shift4. Isaacman predicts that many users of those three systems will want to move to take advantage of the Shift4 features as well as the many incentives being offered like free software updates and free EMV readers. For those moving over to the Shift4 system, there may be many changes happening on the back end, but the user experience doesn’t significantly change. “We’re still processing transactions the same way as you would without Shift4 in that you’re still swiping a card, you’re still inserting a card if it’s a chip card or an EMV card— it’s just all the magic that happens once you do it,” explains Isaacman. “What it does do is it opens up a lot of other options. “For example, let’s say you have a bar or restaurant owner that has three
There’s going to be a wealth of functionality that is being made available to all customers.
Irish pubs on Main Street, but the fourth one they want to open is going to be in a hotel. In the past, they might not have had the means to use the tokenization or the property management system interface that’s necessary to open that business inside a hotel. Now all that functionality is available to them.” And Shift4 Payments isn’t stopping with POS systems and payment processing. In a world where bar and restaurant owners now need to barbizmag.com
communicate with a number of thirdparty applications like scheduling software, online reservation services like OpenTable, and online ordering portals like Uber Eats, the organization aims to simplify and integrate all of these connections, as well. “The environment for bar owners and restaurateurs is only getting more complicated,” says Isaacman. “So even
though on the surface it appears like that complexity is growing and the number of vendors that the restaurateur or bar owner is going to have to manage is increasing, we’re putting a considerable amount of effort on trying to simplify that and make our customers’ lives easier. There’s a lot in store for this year that we’re really excited to announce.”
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Bar Tour
Bar Tour
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Charlotte’s
Farmingdale, New York
Resurrecting an original speakeasy.
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alk into Charlotte’s Frozen Yogurt and go to the bouncer at the back of the shop. Give him the wrong password, and you’re out of luck. Say the right word, however, and you’ll be ushered through the bookcase and downstairs into Charlotte’s Speakeasy. Both the yogurt shop and the speakeasy below it are owned by brothers John and Nick DeVito, who were looking to move from the paper business into a new venture. After moving into their current location in Farmingdale, New York, they found the basement was an unusual space with twelve-foot ceilings and the remnants of tin wallpaper and a tin ceiling. The brothers spoke to the mayor, the previous owners, and a village historian who all confirmed that the basement had been a speakeasy in the 1920s. “We had always intended on doing something with the basement and the large outdoor space,” says Nick DeVito. “Once we found out what it had been, we decided that if we were going
to do anything with it, we would have to restore it to a speakeasy.” Meanwhile, the yogurt shop took off, and within a year and a half, the brothers decided it was time to resurrect the speakeasy. They called in Leah Plevrites, Founder of studioBIG, who had designed their yogurt shop. Plevrites handled the entire design of the bar as well as the financing and project management. A contractor hired by the DeVito brothers handled all of the construction work. Plevrites was also tasked with creating branding and a logo. Her goal was to create a simple, mysterious logo. When she went into the basement to measure and survey the space, she happened upon the perfect solution on the tin wallpaper from the original speakeasy—a fleur-delis pattern with draped pearls. “We said this is really the heart of the place because we found something that really existed when people came here in the 20s,” says Plevrites. For the logo, she simplified the tin’s design and added the word Charlotte’s so people would know the bar was
June 2018 barbizmag.com
All Photos: Harriet Andronikides.
By Ashley Bray
Bar Tour within Charlotte’s. “But it didn’t have to say ‘speakeasy’ because we didn’t want it to be so blatantly marketed,” she says. “The difference between this and upstairs would be that this emblem represented the bar.” Not that guests have a hard time distinguishing between the two spaces. The speakeasy is a sexy update on the southern charm Plevrites put into the design of the yogurt shop. “Instead of banana yellow, baby blue, warm pastel colors, and whites, we did gold, deep navys, and blacks,” she says. “It’s like you’re going downstairs into the adult version of Charlotte’s.” Plevrites’ design strikes a balance between glamorous and grungy. “We decided to do this bar in a way that spoke to the modern-day patron or guest but also paid respects to its genuine history,” she says. “So we allowed certain areas to be grungy. For example, there’s one wall behind a velvet curtain that I left completely naked that has an archway toward the back staircase to the outside patio.” Part of the “modern-day” touches involved bringing parts of the basement up to code, including the staircase entrance and the back patio staircase, which was the original secret entrance into the speakeasy. “It was just cellar doors flat on the ground. This was a good way to hide it from the police back
in the day but did not work for a modern, legal establishment,” says DeVito. “We built a large entrance with a high ceiling and a chandelier. We also had to change the pitch of the stairs and make them wider to comply with the modern codes.” For the entryway, Plevrites salvaged some of the tin wallpaper that was well preserved behind the original stairs and used it to line the perimeter of the stairwell. “I lit it from the bottom with uplighting so you could really see the pattern,” she says. Plevrites also found wallpaper with a mirror-like quality—for much less than actual mirror—and she put it up in the entrance to reflect the chandelier. The reflective wallpaper was also used around the seating areas. Other modern updates included a bathroom, which was put in below the stairs to save space and to prevent patrons from having to climb the stairs and use the yogurt shop’s bathroom. “We really had to capitalize on every square foot that we had for the space because it’s rather small,” says Plevrites. A boiler unit in the basement also had to be boxed in with a fire-rated access door (it would have been too costly to move the units). The door had to be metal and wasn’t going to fit in with the aesthetic, so Plevrites planned to put it on the side of the boiler room, mainly out of
sight. However, halfway through the project, the contractor said he could cover the door with wood and detailing so that it would better fit the bar’s aesthetic. So Plevrites moved the door to the front of the boiler room, which allowed for booths to be placed in the nook to the side of the boiler room. This resulted in a better use of the space and plenty of room for dancing and live music. “The owner didn’t want booths in an area where they’d want live music because they wanted to have mobile furniture there,” explains Plevrites, who instead placed four-top tables in the space, which can be easily moved when a band is playing. When designing the speakeasy’s layout, Plevrites started by figuring out the bar’s footprint and where to place it. Since she isn’t a bar expert, she brought in an outside consultant from Tri-State Marketing Associates, a supplier of bar equipment, to help with this process. “They have a consultant that interviews you about what you envision having this bar do and what type of drinks you serve,” says Plevrites. “They were able to help us source and also plan out the equipment portion of the bar, which allowed me to realize how much linear feet I needed for the bar.” Plevrites located the bar to the right of the entry staircase, which ended up being the perfect location as it’s adjacent
Guests enter through a bookcase and descend the stairs into the speakeasy.
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Bar Tour
John & Nick DeVito
Owners of Charlotte’s; Leah Plevrites, Founder of studioBIG
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hen the DeVito brothers were looking to branch out from the paper industry, a speakeasy wasn’t the first thing on their minds. “We moved our business from NYC [to Farmingdale, New York] five years ago and still operate from the back of this building,” says Nick DeVito. “We asked the people in the area what they wanted, and we mostly heard ‘coffee.’ We chose ice cream/frozen yogurt and coffee because there were many restaurants and bars but no dessert places.” Charlotte’s Frozen Yogurt, named after the brothers’ mother and grandmother, was born. But when they discovered that their basement had once served as a real speakeasy in the 1920s, they jumped at the chance to restore it. They brought on Leah Plevrites, founder of studioBIG (which stands for Branding, Interiors, and Graphics), to bring the speakeasy to life. “At the end of the day, when I see customers have a drink and experiencing the space that I designed and every single detail that I poured my heart and soul into, it’s very gratifying,” she says.
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to a storage space where employees have easy access to ice, extra kegs, extra furniture, etc. Budget constraints limited what they could use for the bar top—until inspiration hit. “We had to redo a beam and some columns to make it safe, engineering wise, for this to be a functioning bar. So we had to remove some of the original, existing beams that were holding up the floor above us,” says Plevrites. “They were nice wood, but they didn’t fit the modern code requirements. So we took those beams, shaved them down thinner, put a sealant over them, and made them the bar top.” Wood from the beams was also used to create candleholders and as the back covers for the menus. The covers of the menu were made from leftover pieces of the tin wallpaper that were cleaned up and painted. The menu was printed on paper from the DeVito brothers’ business. “It attracts so much attention because its three-dimensional, which most menus aren’t,” says Plevrites. The bar area is where Plevrites splurged on finishes and an antique mirror. “We put this antique mirror to reflect the bar to make it look more open,” she says. “The face of the bar was going to be black, and I wanted there to be a lot of reflective material by the bar so that it could also draw your attention there.” The chevron herringbone pattern in the wood porcelain floor (real wood or
any porous materials couldn’t be used because it’s a basement) also subtly draws the guest’s eye to the bar. For the walls, Plevrites chose a navy blue, fleur-de-lis wallpaper—a nod to the original tin wallpaper. Cork mosaic tiles back the area where the wine is displayed. The ceiling looks like the original tin but is actually a plastic material painted to match the color of the tin—a big budget saver. DeVito family photos, historic pictures, and vintage signs hang on the walls and give the space a homey feel. The unique lighting is a mix of candles and different sized and shaped glass bottles that hang overhead. For the seating areas, Plevrites chose a mix of seating styles, heights, textures, and colors. She placed gold velvet chairs near the bar to break up all of the dark colors. She took an industrial style of metal bar stools and added glam to them by finishing them in gold and using custom upholstery so that guests would be comfortable. Brown leather Chesterfield-like sofas and dark wood chairs also dot the layout and feed into the glam/grungy theme. “I don’t like when things look too similar,” she says, “because then it just starts to look very corporate. Different heights, different styles bring a little more character.” Plevrites created seating “nooks” throughout the bar, which she finds create a better spatial arrangement and flow and speak better to the guest, who then establishes a favorite area in the bar.
An outdoor patio expands the speakeasy’s space.
June 2018 barbizmag.com
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Bar Tour The DeVito brothers hope guests will also have a favorite drink on the cocktail menu, which reflects the past and some modern-day trends. Popular drinks include the 1920’s Mule, Prohibition Fizz (Stoli Raspberry Vodka, Cointreau, cranberry juice, sweet & sour), the Bourbon Peach Palmer (bourbon, apricot brandy, peach nectar, iced tea or lemonade, honey, peach and lemon slices), and the New Old Fashion (blackberry whiskey, chocolate whiskey, orange bitters, cherries). Thanks to the desserts shop upstairs, the DeVito brothers often add their sweet treats into cocktails. “Every week we do different drink specials. Depending on the time of year or holiday, we can combine ice cream or our other frozen desserts with our drink menu,” says DeVito. “For St Patrick’s Day, we did Baileys Irish Cream over a variety of different ice cream flavors. For the summer months, we will combine our pomegranate raspberry sorbet, orange splash sorbet, or coconut frozen yogurt
into a variety of frozen alcoholic drinks.” In addition to the cocktails, Charlotte’s offers a “house fare” menu of a few small bites including chicken wings, sliders, and a charcuterie plate. The DeVito brothers may be new to the bar business, but so far their venture has proven successful. “People have been very appreciative of our restoring a piece of Long Island history, and the addition of a venue for live jazz music has been very well received by all our patrons,” says DeVito. Charlotte’s also hosts theme nights, and in April they held a Casablanca night where they showed movie clips, a band played songs from the movie, and guests dressed in the style of the film. With warmer weather arriving, the DeVito brothers look forward to opening the outdoor patio for drinking and dancing under the stars. Just be sure you have the password before you go, which changes weekly and can always be found on the speakeasy’s website. If you’re in a real
Wood from the original beams was used to create candleholders and menu back covers.
jam, the kids working in the yogurt shop may be able to give you the password along with a sweet treat—but you didn’t hear that from us. charlottesspeakeasy.com; studioBIGny.com
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14 Barritt’s Ginger Beer
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Q&A with Kelley Jones
1
What leadership traits make a good bar owner?
Passion is probably one of the most important traits as well as knowledge and being a student of your craft. If it ain’t broke, break it—how do you continually improve? I don’t care how good it is, it can always be improved upon. Also, the big thing is leadership creates followership. People don’t follow companies—people follow people. And there’s no other way to lead than by example.
2
President & COO, Partner of Hospitality Alliance
H
ospitality Alliance is a bicoastal consulting, development, and management company made up of experts in the hotel and food and beverage industries. It provides services for hotels, restaurants, bars, and developers including concept development, leasing, construction project management, hiring, training, opening of new concepts, and ongoing operational management. The team has developed, opened, and operated high-profile restaurants, bars, and clubs across the country. “What happens all too often is that developers get to the master planning and setting up prior to concept development. So you’ve got the tail wagging the dog instead of the dog wagging the tail,” says Kelley Jones. “We typically come in from the very beginning. The concept development will drive the design, the design drives the kitchen and bar setup. And we’re also a management company. We can do as much or as little as our clients want.”
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Advice for managing employees?
Here’s what I know for a fact— my restaurants and bars can open every single day without me, but they can’t run one day without my staff. So I look at it from an upside down organizational chart. Every single guest that meets every server or bartender in one of my properties—they are that property to that guest. What I think a lot of owners fail to recognize is that how you treat your team is a direct impact on how they treat your guest. Always be evolving, bring in your people and let them collaborate, and make sure you’re training. The more you expect from people, the more you have to train them.
3
Advice for training employees?
[In the majority of training in our industry,] there’s no true road map to what the goals are that you want your employees to know. And my only goal is very simple—I want them to know every single answer to any question a guest might ask them. So my training is different. I don’t make my staff memorize the menu. I make them memorize the questions that people are going to ask like: What’s the portion size? What are the ingredients? Who’s the designer [of the bar]? What other things has the designer done? Who are the managers? What’s the address and phone number? I think training is the most important thing because there are two answers I hate: A, “I didn’t know.” Well, that’s an indication that we didn’t train you well enough, or you don’t care enough to know. And B, “Because that’s the way it’s always been.” Just because it’s been that way for the last two years, is that the best way for it to be now?
4
Advice for managing Millennials?
From a generational standpoint, understanding what motivates different generations is important. With Millennials, they’re no different than any other generation in the workforce, but they’re motivated not necessarily just by money, but by being inclusive, by being socially conscious. One of the biggest things is how you identify and onboard the Millennial. Have their pre-printed business cards ready for them. That immediately sets up the relationship of we’re here for you, you’re here for us; we represent you, you represent us. It gives you the ability to truly set the tone of what it’s going to be like to work together, and you start that at day one. The first 90 days are critical at any job. The top three reasons people leave jobs are number one, because they don’t like the people they’re working with. Number two, because they don’t understand what they’re growth path is. And number three, money, obviously. A lot of people are shocked that money isn’t the first reason people leave, especially Millennials.
5
What should bar owners look for in a new hire?
My biggest thing, especially with the Internet, is to check references. I’m going to go and find out what your work history is, and I’m going to go and take the time to reach out to those restaurants and find out what they really think of you. I can train the mechanics of our business, but I can’t train hospitality—warm, personal, engaging. And so that’s what I look for in new hires. What’s your energy? Are you smiling? Are you making eye contact? We really want to know people’s personalities.
June 2018 barbizmag.com
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