CHAPTER
11

Setting Up Your Bar and Beverage Systems

In This Chapter

• Making the bar an effective marketing tool
• Current trends in bar seating
• Creating an eat-in friendly bar
• Tools of the bartending trade
• Service of nonalcoholic beverages

In this chapter, we’ll discuss how to merchandize and stage your bar and draw guests into it. We’ll talk about how to make your bar a comfortable and hospitable place for guests to drink, eat, and socialize. We’ll also talk about some of the recent trends in bar seating.

We’ll also show you some of the tools and equipment you’ll need in your bar, and give you tips on preparing and serving memorable nonalcoholic beverages as well.

The strongest emotion you want to evoke is to make the customer want to have a drink (or two) in your restaurant’s bar. Remember alcohol, soft drinks, coffee, and tea are all high-profit items.

For a high-end Italian steakhouse, Jody used the back bar to create a real feeling of “Wow! Let’s have a drink here!” He took a supermarket shelf approach, rather than placing single bottles of each brand next to one another. He created a powerful graphic by selecting a case of each bottle by color. Bands of blue bottles, clear, amber, white, and green also gave a feeling of abundance that worked with the expensive, indulgent food menu.

You should give the bar a clean and uncluttered look that puts the focus on the bottles. This is not the place to tuck or tack up photos, slogans, or lotto cards.

Bottle Placement

Bottles should not be set up randomly every day. Your design should be blueprinted so you can spot bottles that need replacing, and so the bartenders’ access is standard from shift to shift. You’ve got to make sure your bartenders understand that they’re not allowed to alter your system. As you analyze your bar sales, you might end up adjusting your display later on, but that change should be blueprinted, too.

The traditional way of setting up the back bar takes into consideration that we read from left to right. On your speed rail, the shelf containing the well or rail bottles—the brands the house uses when a customer doesn’t request a brand—are kept at the ready, along with the bottles you use most often for making drinks. For instance, a Mexican restaurant will include two brands of tequila and a bottle of triple sec on the speed rail. A Cuban restaurant will include extra brands of rum on the speed rail. This is your working shelf. As much as possible, the back bar should be a display.

SMART MOVE

With creative lighting, your bar can look like a temple. There are many ways to use lighting to draw guests to your bar, and many options for lighting from long-lasting LED lights to colored and string lights. Creative lighting can evoke any mood your concept calls for.

Place the distilled spirits you sell the most at the left end of the most accessible shelf. That’s usually vodka, though brown spirits such as bourbon and scotch are catching up. Place all your brands of vodka in a row. Follow them with your tequila brands (if that’s what you sell the most of), then with rum, gin, scotch, bourbon, brandies, and finally after-dinner drinks. Make sure all the labels face forward and can be seen. Lesser-used bottles go on the higher shelves.

Wines can be displayed much the same way, with your most popular sellers running from left to right. If your restaurant specializes in wine, there are many shelving options to provide a bountiful display.

With the growth of the American craft beer movement, many restaurants and bars have expanded the number of brews on tap, and many offer locally produced brews. Some beer-centric restaurants keep their supplies of beer behind the bar in tall, refrigerated display cases. The creative labels on craft beer bottles add to the visual energy.

You should mount the POS at the front bar. It’s a great way to minimize skimming by the bartender. The display is close to the guests and they can see if the bartender has rung up their drinks at the correct price. This was a ground-breaking change in controlling the bartender.

Eat-In Bars

Eating at the bar is more popular than ever, and many savvy diners prefer it. It’s perfect for dining alone because it takes away the loneliness of sitting at a table by oneself, as the waiter removes all the other place settings.

You can offer your full menu or a bar menu. Late-night menus are also popular. Think about how and where the servers will deliver the food to the bar, and who will deliver it to the customer. Bartenders usually offer menus to guests and place napkins on the bar as tablecloths, a simple yet hospitable touch. The bartender will need storage for napkins, cutlery, and condiments.

Barstools with backs are more comfortable than those without. A trend in bar seating is upholstered seats and backs. Backless metal stools, though appealing to a contemporary aesthetic, are hard and uncomfortable and your guests will not linger long.

Hooks beneath the bar, for customers to hang purses or bags, are definitely necessary. Customers can then stash their bags out of the way, which is good for the restaurant, and they’re comfortable having their stuff close by.

Couture Cocktails

The trend of bartenders becoming beverage chefs or mixologists is a bit overplayed. Jody feels the same way about bartenders as he does about chefs. Any cocktails they create must express the restaurant’s concept and be profitable. The recipes are blueprinted and made to measure. No tweaking is allowed.

Recently, there’s been a renaissance of craft distilling, and many contemporary bartenders are using whiskey from Colorado, brandy from California, and gin from Long Island. These small-batch spirits are expensive to make, so they cost more. If it ties into your concept to use craft spirits and your market will bear higher prices, then go to it. Otherwise, stick to the tried-and-true commercial brands.

Along with a movement toward major liquor companies selling flavored vodkas, contemporary bartenders are infusing liquors with flavorings such as hot peppers, fruits, and spices. House-infused liquor can make your drinks stand out and are lower cost, since you’re using standard brands of liquor.

POTENTIAL PITFALL

Some state alcohol control boards, such as Tennessee’s, are beginning to crack down on house-infused liquors. Infusing distilled spirits without having a distillery permit is against federal law. With the strong trend toward artisan products, there’s a pushback against the crackdown. Stay on top of your local food news for developments.

Remember the popularity, preparation, and profitability (PPP) test we talked about in Chapter 5? After the first month, you should run the PPP test on the cocktails and make adjustments accordingly.

Garnishes such as orange slices, limes, olives, pickled onions, house-brandied cherries, jalapeños, mint, and cilantro provide a fresh and colorful working display at the bar, and can entice customers into ordering your restaurant’s signature cocktail. Note that the balance of cool cocktails and great garnishes needs to be filtered against how much time it takes to execute.

Bar Seating

Lounge or residential seating in a bar is popular and comfortable. Also, if you place it right, it won’t limit your flexibility. A large cluster of seats like a mini living room can lose its sense of invitation if two people sit in it. No one else will want to invade their space.

To counter this, don’t create tight areas. Try to keep the room more open. If the chairs can be pulled together or moved, it makes people feel at home. Couches also have an intimacy. If you want to commit a large space to a sofa and one person sits on it and no one else feels comfortable sitting there, too, it’s a waste of space. A smaller loveseat is a better way to go.

A cocktail table is good for resting drinks, but as more people like to order and share food in lounge areas an intermediate-height table, which is between a café and a cocktail table height of around 36 inches, is a better solution. There are also tables with adjustable legs that can be raised if guests order food.

Small side tables for drinks and trays prevent guests from trying to balance a drink or plate on the arm of a sofa. Large, upholstered, amorphous-shaped seating pieces are useful, as they can be placed back to back. Floor lamps and accent lights warm these areas.

A fireplace is a home run, but during summer you’ll need to stage it with candles or a goldfish bowl. Don’t leave it clean and empty. The same is true of outdoor patios. Be thoughtful of what they look like out of season. They should always be staged.

Bar Tools

The cost of bar equipment can really add up, so the beginning restaurateur on a limited budget should look at used equipment and bartender hacks. Here are the tools of the bartending trade:

• A professional stainless steel (18/8) shaker
• Long spoons or implements for stirring
• Strainer spoons
• A sharp paring knife
• Cutting boards
• Zesters
• Peelers
• Muddlers
• Jiggers and measurers
• Corkscrews
• A blender
• Specialized ice cube trays or ice machine
• A recipe book with house versions of classic and house special cocktails

DEFINITION

A muddler is a baton-like instrument bartenders use to mash ingredients such as lemons and mint to extract juices and flavors for cocktails.

Having the recipe book available is useful to the entire staff. Servers might need to reference it to describe certain drink ingredients. Many professional bartenders keep notebooks in which they note flavors of brands, and keep records of drinks they create and their equipment hacks.

A great hack for a muddler was shared online by bartender Jeffrey Morgenthaler of Portland, Oregon. He saves money and creates a customized muddler by sawing a 10-inch French rolling pin (the kind with tapered ends) in half. He sands both ends and rubs them with food-grade mineral oil. The two different-sized tapered ends make the muddler more versatile.

Ice Cubes

Ice cubes have become part of the repertoire of the contemporary mixologist, no matter whether they’re big spheres, 2 × 2-inch cubes, little cubes, or pebbles of clear ice. Bartenders are also freezing cubes of frozen blood orange, ginger beer spheres, square cubes filled with intricate patterns of cucumber, and clear cubes filled with house-made brandied cherries.

Bartenders do amazing things with ice. Bartender “Boston Mike” at Max’s Downtown in Hartford developed a drink based on a cube of smoked ice. He smoked the water and froze it in 2 × 2-inch molds. Water can be smoked by placing a container of water in a wood-fired smoker, or by adding a liquid smoke product to the water. He then infused bourbon with Tahitian vanilla beans and citrus zest. To make his signature Vanilla on a Rock, he shook the infused bourbon with dry curacao and bitters. Every mixologist worth his Himalayan salt swears by his favorite bottle of bitters.

DEFINITION

Dry curacao is a clear brandy flavored with orange skins, then mixed with cognac and spiced with anise and sweetened. Bitters are concentrated botanical extracts made from various herbs, flowers, roots, or seeds. Originally created as a cure for ailments, today bitters are a trendy ingredient in cocktails. Added in small doses or dashes, they add depth and balance to drinks.

The Vanilla on the Rock’s smoked ice slowly melts, and the smoke flavor enhances the vanilla flavors of the infused bourbon. The play of strong brown spirits and sweet and deep flavors made this drink an experience for which the high-end business clientele were willing to pay top dollar.

When it comes to ice, you’ve got to figure out if the wow factor—do you need six different types of ice?—is worth it. If you’re selling glasses of rare bourbons at $30 to $50 a glass, waking them up with a 3-inch sphere of ice (which won’t water down the drink) makes it more special.

Kold Draft ice machines filter the water and make clear, pure, condensed cubes that many bartenders love. The machines are expensive, ranging up to around $4,000. If special ice cubes are intrinsic to your concept, save money by picking up a secondhand ice machine.

Your Coffee, Tea, and Soft Drinks Setup

Serving espresso at the bar gives a restaurant a European style. But only a few highly trained staff should operate the espresso maker. Having every waiter making cappuccinos for their customers is risky, especially because they often forsake finesse for speed. Espresso makers are complicated machines, and they’re expensive. A brand-new commercial four-dispenser machine runs in the $16,000 range. You can get a decent two- to three-handle machine for around $5,000. Think about how much espresso you’ll be serving before you make such an investment.

Coffee and Specialty Drinks

Coffee and specialty drinks should be made at the bar if you don’t have convenient room in the kitchen. Having the waiters or crew going back to the bowels of the restaurant to make coffee isn’t a good idea. They like to get out of sight and will stay lost if you let them.

The kitchen, however, can be a staging area for coffee drinks if there’s room. You can brew it in the back kitchen and hold it in airpots—thermal vessels that will maintain quality and heat for long periods without creating a burnt or sour flavor. However, it’s best to brew coffee fresh in the service area. Don’t co-mingle a coffee station with a clean, dry POS station.

SMART MOVE

Sugar comes in many forms, and bringing your guest a choice of sugars—white, raw, artificial, or plant-based stevia—tells the guest about your restaurant’s attention to detail. Don’t ask a customer who orders coffee if they want sugar; just bring it.

Cold Beverages

Cold beverages are usually kept in the waiter station, if space allows. The beverage station can be staged to look part of the design aesthetic. It could be a farm table with bowls of lemons and limes, sugar cane, and pitchers of iced tea and lemonade lined up.

The bar is also a great staging area for cold beverages. The rule is to arrange for efficiency and to gather all pre-service–style drinks (water, iced tea, etc.) in one location, and use that same location to gather the after-service drinks.

The dining room has several service needs. The days of a bussing station are over, thank you! Stacking dirty dishes in a greasy bus bin in a holding area in the dining room until the busboy, often with an ill-fitting, dirty apron, totes them back to the kitchen seems unsanitary these days.

Today, tables are cleared by hand or on trays and brought straight back to the dish drop-off area.

Water requires storage. You can install an in-house water bottling station where you can fill bottles with filtered clear or bubbling water. If you don’t have room for this at the bar, it can be placed in the kitchen.

The dining room service station for resetting tables can be a great piece of furniture or a hutch. Place linens in the two lower drawers, silverware in the top drawer, and glasses on the shelves. The POS and resetting stations should be separate, as they have different uses.

You can distinguish your restaurant with great cold beverages, such as iced tea, if you take the time to select an attractive glass and layer it with fresh mint and clementine slices. Simple syrup for sweetening iced tea is a given nowadays, as opposed to trying to dissolve a sugar cube. Free refills are another choice that needs to be considered in light of the average check and the quality of service. Free refills generate goodwill.

Standard juices, lemonade, and drinks that come from a soda gun in a post-mix fashion are losing popularity, as they are low quality. Bottling your own organic soda can be a cool touch sure to be noticed by your patrons. Fresh-squeezed limeade or lemonade can be a great refreshing beverage, but the amount of production will determine the price.

Many bars opt for club service, in which they sell individual bottles of cola. There’s a big price difference, so you need to gauge your selling price before you go this route.

The Least You Need to Know

• Alcohol and nonalcoholic drinks are high-profit items, so staging your bar correctly is important to your business.
• Use your back bar display to merchandize your beverage offerings.
• Eating while seated at the bar has become more popular than ever, and there are many creative ways to accommodate this.
• Lounge and residential seating in a bar requires 36-inch cocktail tables so that guests can order and share food.