If you have ever owned or managed a bar, you are aware of the never-ending battle to keep you liquor inventory and cost in check. It’s hard; between employees giving away free drinks, over-pouring and just plain bottle theft, it’s difficult to keep costs down. Liquor isn’t cheap—especially top-shelf!  There are several preventative measures you can take to reduce (if not completely eliminate) the problem. Unfortunately free drinks being given away and over-pouring is becoming a fact life in the bar business. On a good note, consistently well-made drinks will bring customers back and there is action you can take to start combating the problem. I, personally, have worked in/or around the bar business for 7 years. I have held a variety of duties from cocktail waitressing to bartending, to management and marketing. Thus giving me my knowledge and experience to advise from.

            One good place to start is by hiring quality employees. Experience is always helpful; however, in some instances it’s good to start fresh because if an employee has been trained improperly before, it’s hard to break bad habits. Everyone you hire should be extremely willing to learn, take direction, and have a good morale good for doing what is right and following instruction. Be consistent; try to have a uniform policy for training all employees so everyone is on the same page. Most people learn by watching others so you want to make sure that the “others” they are learning from are doing exactly what you want them to do. Also be sure to make sure that everyone knows the rules and the consequences of breaking them and try to be consistent and fair in that aspect as well. I’ve found two ways to safely give employees the range to give “free” drinks. One way to control this is to give them a small tab (like $20 every shift) that they can give to whomever they want. It should normally be reserved for deserving customers or if for some reason someone receives bad service but we understand that the bartender should be rewarded for recruiting their friends into the bar. Another is to advise your employees to just ask a manager if they feel someone deserves something for free and they can add it to their manager tab. Both of these methods are good because then ALL liquor is accounted for. One thing to watch out for is most states forbid the “comping” of alcohol so make sure to research the proper way to adjust someone’s bill containing alcohol or how to give someone free or discounted alcohol. To help keep employees motivated to ring everything up, have shift contests to see who can ring up the most in sales. This method is beneficial two-fold because everything gets rang up and it actually motivates your staff to sell more or up-sell to more expensive brands. Another thing would be to frequently “quiz” for employees to check up on their pouring/drink making skills. It’s important to remember to reward or praise employees who following the rules and performing according to your standards!

Shot measurements can vary from bar to bar. The popular standard is 1 oz, which is a 3 second-count pour. *Make sure to reference you area’s laws because some cities, counties and states have different standards* Most experienced bartenders will follow this and know this. If you don’t trust your employees to adhere to a strict count pour you are in luck because there are several different types of bar equipment that can take the guess work out of pouring properly. One piece of equipment is a liquor dispensing system. It is a gravity feed system with counting meters. You can set the meters up for the exact pour amount you desire. This system virtually eliminates the problem of over-pouring because you will notice if an employee is turning the dial more than once. The second most effective method is to use a controlled pour instead of a free pour. You can get measured liquor pours in several different ounce measurements so you can personalize it to your bar’s needs. They also come with different features: dust covers that will keep dust and bugs out, different colors so you can coordinate colors to liquor costs, collars to make removal from bottle easer and designs to fight contamination and evaporation.

Pours certainly help but they do have their loopholes. In theory you should be able to tell when an employee is over-pouring when they are making one drink and you see them tip the bottle back more than once. Having extensive experience behind the bar and used a controlled pour before I know that sometimes it does not pour the exact correct amount on the first pour so you do have to tip it again sometimes. This situation usually occurs in user error or the person prior using that bottle only took a partial shot from that pour. Like I said the pours help greatly, they act like training wheels for the bartender, but they do have their faults. Another piece of bar equipment you can use called a jigger. A jigger  is a stainless steel shot glass with a  single shot pour on one side and ½ shot pour on the other. The bartender pours the liquor from the bottle using a free-pour dispenser and measures the liquor for the drink using the jigger. It’s the same concept as using measuring cups. You can also order jiggers in different ounce measurements to customize it to your bar’s needs.

Now for the downfalls to using a jigger… This method only works if you bartender follows this recipe to a “t”. The jigger is best used amongst experienced bartenders with confidence and control because the jigger allows for extra spillage. It can be more time consuming for your bartender so that means they are serving fewer drinks. You also create more dishes that need to be cleaned. All in all, it is still a better method than using a free-pour alone and allowing your employees to freely add as much liquor as they desire to a drink.

In terms of monitoring your employees, security cameras always help and are beneficial for many reasons. Most importantly they help deter theft and provide evidence if theft does occur. You can also use the system to watch and see if employees are over-pouring or not ringing drinks in. One bit of advice that I would like to add is that if you do catch someone on camera, it’s good to point out their mistakes and reward employees when they are good to let them know that you are monitoring them. Let everyone know you have a camera system monitoring them as they work regardless because there may be statutes in your state requiring you notify anyone if they are being recorded by surveillance equipment. Cameras work as great deterrent for theft, over-pouring and the giving away of free drinks, so if your business is on a budget you can buy simulated security cameras to make employees think they are being watched. Now, you will from time to time encounter employees that don’t care and will give things away for free or over-pour even though they know they are being watched, so cameras don’t offer a 100% guarantee but they are very, very helpful. I highly recommend having a camera surveillance system on your safe as well as in your coolers and liquor storage rooms. Bottle theft will hurt your liquor cost and inventory the most. Not only are you out the cost of the bottle but you are also out of the potential profit made on that bottle. Having security cameras can help battle against bottle theft almost 100%. Another bit of advice I can offer is to send in secret shoppers or dummy customers to put your employees to the test. Obviously you must recruit people that no one in your bar staff knows. Secret shoppers are probably the most efficient and cheapest way to monitor your employees. It’s also good to get outside feedback as to how well your employees are performing.

As far as actual bar equipment goes, liquor dispensing systems, pours, jiggers and security cameras are the best items I can recommend for combating rising liquor costs, theft and incorrect inventory. There are a few other methods I can recommend to help fight these problems. One hint would be to do a quick-count of your inventory after close every night. Keeping track of this can help you catch theft or serious problems almost immediately and it’s a good thing to have on file to reference back to if a problem does arise. It is necessary to do a complete and thorough inventory at least once a month. It is also good to do an empty bottle inventory that you can compare against your sales and regular inventory to check up on over-pouring and free drinks that are given out. It is also good to keep a log in your liquor storage room and every bottle that is taken out is to be written down and signed off by whoever takes it. If you use a security camera in your liquor storage room, you can go back and check the log to verify all liquor that has been removed.

A bar is a bar…sad to say that some things can’t be 100% prevented, but the good news is that there are methods and bar supply tools that can help combat problems with liquor control. Rules will be broken or bent from time to time so these methods aren’t sure-fire but they will certainly help! Remember to: stay consistent with your practices, be involved with every aspect of your bar, and keep your eyes open so you can get the best profit-margin possible out of every bottle of liquor and the best, most responsible service out of your employees.