Bar vs. Banquets...

There is a thin white line between the life of a bartender who works at a bar, proper, and a bartender that works banquets. If you are considering a gig in the poison-slinging industry then you should know the difference and lean in the appropriate direction. I started behind the bar - that's where I cut my teeth so to speak. When I began filling in for banquets on the weekends I already had a bias, even though there are pros and cons to both. Likewise I knew plenty of banquet bartenders who would not go behind a bar to save their lives, so to each their own. My point here is to help folks interested plot a course in the right direction.

You've already heard a lot of what it's like behind the bar, so it only makes sense not to waste time outlining the pros and cons there, as discussing now those of banquets will coversely demonstrate the 'bars' by contrast. Did that make any sense? Anyway, here we go on the great banquet coaster!!!

Banquet's number one advantage is based on a sickening loophole in the tax laws. If you work behind a bar or as a server, legally you HAVE to report your tips and grant the government a portion of them for taxes. In a banquet, you do not.

Now, don't worry, you don't actually HAVE to but you HAVE to, know what I mean? When I started behind the bar the friend that trained me told me, 'do what i do, once a week you have to file this tip sheet right? So just put ten bucks in for every day you work.' Now granted, this position I was taking from him was technically 'barback' on the establishment's records because they wanted to have two bartenders on weeknights and three on weekends, but they didn't want to have to pay them the extra fifteen cents or whatever an hour for the elevated position, so 'barback' it was.* Now, barback is a tricky thing. In my experience at the hotel it was great, because it was really a bartender position. But most of the other barbacks positions I've seen are what equates to a busbuy for the bartender, ie you run and fetch barrels or cases of beer for them, empty dishes and glasses and take them wherever, etc. Grunt work that gets, mostly, a small percentage of the bartender's sales. If you're young and can find no other way of getting in the business then go ahead and take it, but you won't make much and most of what I discuss on this site won't apply or even make sense to you until you're behind the bar. If you want to get into the real business however, don't go this route.

Anyway, to get back on point, yeah, as a banquet bartender you DO NOT legally have to claim you're tips because you do not, for the most part, have 'sales'. Most banquet gigs are tending open bars - that is weddings and company shindigs and the like, where the cost of the bar and everything the guests might drink is included in the cost of renting the banquet hall's room out for the party to begin with. This works to the bartender's advantage in a second way as well, as most folks, when a bartender is promptly making or handing them whatever they ordered without charging them a cent, are quick to tip a buck or two. This combined with the amount most people will drink, acquired through numerous trips to the bar, amounts to more and more dollars in your jar. Think of the last wedding you were at. How many people? Maybe it was small, under one hundred people. But these days when the wedding industry is an ever-escalating behemouth sprouting more and more tentacles folks tend to invite more and more people, until family becomes extended family (Hey! Great Aunt Jackie, her three kids, now grown up with families of their own, and even a couple of guys she used to fuck in the forties on Tuesdays! Glad you could all make it!) and friends become friends, acquaintances, co-workers, doctors, lawyers, friends of friends, etc. You get the point. If that's the case (as in my experience it is more than not) think of all those people returning again and again to the bar. Even if only 75% leave you $1 each time, well, that's a fucking lot.

And it's all under the table.

Plus your hourly. If this is the case, be smart, sign up for direct deposit for your check and never touch them, just let them accumulate like that wedding industry Cthulhu I mentioned before and in seemingly no time you'll have a nice big account for emergencies or eventual nesting.

Now, all that being the upside, here's the downside.

The music. If it's a wedding especially, but anything with a DJ in general, get ready to hear endless streaming of audio diarrhea and watch a ton of uncoordinated white folks do the Macarena, Electric Slide and all other manner of hell-spawned gyrations. I once saw an old man with a walker head out to the dancefloor and attempt to 'cut a rug' to Cher's atrocity 'Power of love'. If I knew then what I know now, I like to think I would have slipped roofies into everyone's drinks and attempted to leave psychologically unscathed. Unfortunately I still wake late at night sometimes screaming from dreams of that horrible sight.

Coupled with this, banquets rely on staff other than the bartender, same as any other service establishment, and for some occult reason banquet facilities almost ALWAYS line their ranks with all manner of sick freaks and losers. I've seen women with facial hair, young kids to stupid to understand the words 'that goes to the bride, the woman sitting at the head table with all the other flowers around her, the one who looks just like the enormous photograph hanging above the cake'. Women to large to fit through side by side loading dock doors, hunched and riveted spines, rheumy eyes, you name it. And what's worse, THEY ARE ALL STUPID. Usually. Not always. I worked with some that weren't, but of course the number of morons in any given event staff are stupid enough to more than out weight the advantages of those who are intelligent and agile.

Also, banquets do not provide the solace of regulars. Meet and greet, drink and eat, goodbye godspeed, now go on home and rest your feet.

Hah, now I'm a fucking poet, huh? Maybe I should change this to 'The Poet Chronicles'? Naw. Generally I hate and do not 'get' poetry. Unless of course some wealthy European ruler would like to pay me to sit around and smoke opium and drink Laudunum, composing verse. THAT I could get into.

So, there's the low down. Read it over and choose wisely. The best gig is one that offers a mix of both of these types, with the bulk of the time being spent behind the bar and a banquet here or there for extra cash. But of course, you can't always get what you want. Let's hope though, that you get what you need.

Free drinks...

...are part of the job, regardless of what anyone tells you. White collar pencil pushers will try to cut costs by telling you that you can't but you can, neigh you must buy your regulars drinks. It's an age old custom and a great way to show your customers you appreciate them.

Buy drinks often and with no expectations attached. If the place you work for has a problem with this, either do it anyway or find a new place to work. And none of this 'Manager approval' bullshit either. If you have to walk over and ask a manager to approve and then input a comp into the POS* system, well, it looks poorly for you and for the place. Chances are though if you're in the kind of place that employs this system they won't get that anyway, so move on.

Now, buying a drink is no substitute for listening to your customers when they want to talk, but buying drinks is a way to let people know you appreciate their business and also, their company. Now as far as not expecting anything back, there is a subtle paradigm here. If you buy a regular chances are they will tip you better - however do not think if they are already tipping you good they should tip you better after you buy them. Some people treat this as a type of race or 'one-up-man-ship spectacle' - in simplest terms the tip should not necessarily increase everytime you buy them another drink. This being said however, sometimes it does. But take this on a day to day basis. Once someone tips you one amount don't expect them to match it every time. If you do that will begin to become apparent in those oh so subtle ways we humans communicate, and you will alienate people you generally like. If you are the type who really only looks at the gig for money and don't care about your regulars as people anyway, then you shouldn't be in the business in the first place. Go sell children in Bangladesh.

Now, you may ask, if you 'do it anyway', is that technically stealing?

Well, I suppose what follows is a great example of what my friends and I call 'if you've convinced yourself, that's great' but here's my answer to that one.

IT'S A BAR.

You are actually doing the owners a favor by incurring good will in the name of the establishment - this is how you acquire and maintain regulars. Regulars mean repeat business for the establishment and repeat business means CONSISTENT INCOME. Period. For You and the bar. If the owners/operators do not want consistent sales, THEY should not be in the business.

It all comes out in the wash, believe me. It may be a different case in places like TGIFuckface's or Appledrool's, but those types of establishment's have no business being discussed in a blog about bars and bartending other than for the purpose of making clear they do not belong here. If you're bartending at one of those, quit now, it will only make your life better, sooner.

About three years into my five year gig at the hotel the management came under the idea that they should all of a sudden not allow us to buy regulars drinks. Now, this is even worse than opening a place with that policy, as most of my regulars were I's regulars and thus consistent customers of the establishment for over twenty years. How insulted would you feel if the place you've been going and having comps for that long all of a sudden said - NOPE, no more comps.

A little Insulted? Maybe.

Very insulted? Yeah, probably. Not that the free drink is the point, but when you're out with friends, you buy one another drinks, because you are friends and buying drinks is a friendly thing to do. A bar you feel at home at and frequent on a regualr basis you may do so for several reasons; atmosphere, good prices, good selection of imbibes,attractive staff, etc. However the one reason above and beyond all of these that seals the deal is the bar you choose to frequent you do so first and foremost because you feel friendship there.

In the situation related above, the staff and I of course fought to retain our rights to buy drinks for our regulars. In the end, my saying 'Never underestimate the power of complacency' rang true, just as it almost always does, and the management completely forgot about what was once such a 'hot idea'. Too busy cheating on their spouses and getting blitzed on a bevy of chemicals themselves, eh? But this was of course a privately run franchise, and as such not under as close corporate scrutiny as a lot of other places are.

Another thing to remember with buying drinks is don't 'play games'. If you buy someone you normally do not, they now may begin to expect it, and you have put yourself in a place where the aforementioned scenarios of one-up-man-ship may escalate. Try it once, maybe not the next time, and then do a 'here and there' trial. If you particularly want to endear yourself to the person, don't buy after they tip you - do it before.

Finally, remember to keep what you do and who you buy to yourself as far as discussion with customers or other staff. The people you work closely with are one thing, but if you begin bragging or offering helpful hints to just anyone all out clusterfuck will occurr. Someone else may begin buying a regular more than you, or you may hear about them making more on a tip from a person you considered 'your' customer. This can only lead to trouble, so heed early. In the end there are two types of people you buy drinks for as a bartender: those who you do it for because you genuinely want to do something nice for them and those who will tip you better because of it. Try your best to keep those worlds separate, even if the people come in and talk to one another.

Now you know, AND KNOWING IS HALF THE BATTLE.


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* Although, in many cases if You are behind a bar with a 'POS' or Point of Sale system like Aloha or Squirrel instead of a honest to goodness cash register, well, you might be in the wrong place to begin with. Of course, that is not always the case, as the bar I worked in at the hotel for five years had a POS and was the shit, still adhering to an old world system in everything else, ie no meaured pouring spouts, no minimus, no ever present manager needed for comping, etc.