DrinkedIn Trends

As part of the new partnership, Nightclub & Bar Show will sponsor the Opening Night Party and donate a Travel Package, including passes to the 2017 Nightclub & Bar Show, for auction at the FRLA Show on Sept. 28. All proceeds from the auction package will be donated to the FRLA Educational Foundation.

“Partnerships like this are extremely exciting, as they result in the top minds from the restaurant, foodservice, bar, and nightlife industries all coming together in one spot,” remarked Questex President and CEO, Kerry Gumas. “By bringing together such complementary industries, attendees and exhibitors have unlimited opportunity to take their business to the next level.”

“We’re proud to have the valuable support of the Nightclub & Bar Convention and Trade Show during this year’s Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show. This partnership will foster meaningful collaboration amongst the industry’s leading players, as well as inspire extraordinary innovations in Florida’s restaurant, lodging and foodservice industries,” said Carol Dover, President & CEO of the Florida Restaurant & Lodging Association. “Florida’s already sterling reputation for unparalleled service and hospitality continues to exceed the expectations of our visitors and residents.”

The Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show, themed Exceeding Culinary Expectations: Master the Emerging Trends, brings in over 8,000 industry professionals for three days of educational programs with topics ranging from menus to management, and more. For more information, please visit: www.flrestaurantandlodgingshow.com

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With more nightclubs and bars experimenting with creative beverage offerings, establishments can set themselves apart through presentation and service. Creating a positive, memorable experience can be as important to the customer as the beverage itself.

Nightclubs and bars are continuing to profit from the “cocktail culture” trend. Guests’ desires for creativity is matched by their willingness to pay more for high quality beverages. At the same time, competition for patrons is strong with many establishments embracing the same trends to attract guests – whether by featuring whiskey, barrel-aged gin, seasonal flavors, mocktails or creatively shaped ice. Competition is also coming from the homefront. As consumers are exposed to creative mixology in bars and clubs and share pictures and recipes through social media, they get more adventurous. Now, they’re more willing to try their own hand at creative mixology at home.

The Right Glass for the Right Beverage

To elevate the beverage experience and keep guests coming back requires choosing the right glass for the right beverage. This creates a visual appeal that draws the eyes of fellow patrons and justifies the premium price to the guest. For example, brilliant glass tumblers, reminiscent of the cut glass of prohibition days, showcase reinventions of currently popular classics from gin to rum to bourbon.

Whether it’s retro or the latest mocktail creation, nothing elevates a beverage like premium glassware that appeals to all of your guests’ senses. Libbey® created the Master’s Reserve® Collection to do just that. Its optical purity and dazzling sparkle make any beverage look stunning. The colors of a rosé or garnish from infused water shine through like with no other glass. Likewise, Master’s Reserve’s precise balance in the hand lets your guests feel the luxuriousness of the glass and quality of the beverage while its resonating ping is music to their ears. Most importantly, the shapes of Master’s Reserve are carefully crafted to enhance flavors and aromas.

Can you believe that we’re already into September? Time is flying, and it’s bringing us fall and winter sports. College football, professional football, professional basketball, professional hockey, the Major League Baseball playoffs… It’s an exciting time that presents ample opportunity for marketing, promotions, and packing your bar full of sports fans of all kinds.

While NCAA football, the NFL, the NBA, the NHL, and MLB are the first sports that come to mind for many Americans, there are several sports out there with big followings. Become the home for these sports, provide a social space for these fans to enjoy their matches, and you’ll not only create customer loyalty, you’ll leverage an additional revenue stream. Embracing soccer, rugby, cricket, various international baseball leagues, and other sports and games people love will give you the edge over your competition.

You’ll want to consult your cable or satellite TV provider to learn more about their sports packages and schedules, of course. But to get you started here’s a list of sports and their most recent champions. We probably don’t need to tell you but just in case, “football” means “soccer” outside of the US.

August

Bundesliga is a professional association football league in Germany. It just so happens to be the football league that boasts the highest average stadium attendance in the world.

Las Vegas –Nightclub & Bar Convention and Trade Show will once again partner with nonprofit CORE (Children of Restaurant Employees) to raise awareness for working families in need at next year’s event, taking place March 27-29, 2017 in Las Vegas.

The 2017 event will feature a CORE booth on the show floor, giving attendees and vendors the opportunity to learn more about the organization and discuss partnership opportunities. The nonprofit will also receive additional exposure throughout the show.

Founded in 2004, CORE has supported over 170 children from almost 100 families across the country and the industry, raising more than 2 million dollars to support the children of food and beverage employees navigating life-altering circumstances or conditions, such as a diagnosed medical condition or death of a sibling or parent or loss of home due to natural disaster, fire, or other unexpected housing emergency. CORE provides support in a variety of ways including, but not limited to, paying medical costs and hospital expenses, providing rent and mortgage assistance, and covering childcare costs and other child needs.

“CORE makes a huge impact in the lives of families in need,” remarked Michelle Osborne, Nightclub & Bar Media Group marketing director. “It is our hope that by getting CORE in front of the world’s largest gathering of industry professionals, others will want to get involved in the nonprofit’s mission.”

In its 32nd year, the Nightclub & Bar Show is the largest gathering of bar, nightlife and beverage professionals. The show offers industry professionals the opportunity to connect with suppliers, network with new businesses, discover new products and gain critical skills to ensure their success in the dynamic bar and nightclub industry. For those interested in attending the show or for more information, please visit www.ncbshow.com.

How bars and clubs can do their bit for the environment.

The Perennial, a bar and restaurant in San Francisco, is doing its part for the world. Opened last January, the thinking behind this whole venture is to be as sustainable and good for the earth as possible.

The first way The Perennial does this is using up as many leftover food and drink items as it can (see this story that ran in Nightclub & Bar). But the food is just the first part. 

Another major undertaking at Perennial is to reduce ice usage, which has a two-fold advantage: both water and energy are saved. To this end, no cocktails are stirred or shaken. “We have no water waste on the entire menu,” says bar director Jennifer Colliau. She explains further: “Drinks that would normally be stirred are batched and pre-diluted, held in the freezer, and poured to order. Drinks that are normally shaken are assembled in mason jars and have a specific amount of ice added. They’re then put on the blender, not to make a slushy drink, but to blend until the ice is completely dissolved, thus providing the correct level of dilution and temperature reduction every time.”

The Perennial also uses straws made of actual straw. These are completely natural and compostable, Colliau says. She can’t use “so-called ‘biodegradable’ straws” because they take 9 months to biodegrade and in San Francisco compost must biodegrade in three. “We use a combination of a metal straw and a spoon to ‘straw taste’ drinks; each bartender has their own that can be reused all night without washing and without wasting,” she points out. There is a downside, however. “Guests bite on them and they split, and then they can get really cranky.”

In evaluating its forecasted growth expectations for beverage alcohol sales at the nation's bars and restaurants, Chicago-based Technomic expects to see modest improvements in 2016, the market research firm says. This comes from research conducted for Technomic's Adult Beverage Planning Program, a membership-based program delivering suppliers with research on key topics and trends related to the adult beverage on-premise industry.

Although the overall restaurant industry has been experiencing stronger momentum, slower traffic at major casual dining chains and an evolving consumer dynamic are resulting in a "new normal" in which consumer drink purchase patterns have changed, the market research firm found. For 2016, Technomic expects overall consumer spending on beverage alcohol in the away-from-home channel to grow at a modest 2.3 percent, with similar expectations for 2017, it says. Total alcohol volume in bars and restaurants is expected to be flat in 2016, it adds.

"It's true that the operating environment is better for many restaurants and bars, but consumer occasions that include an alcohol beverage at these establishments are not growing," said David Henkes, senior principal at Technomic and head of the firm's beverage practice, in a statement. "We see a number of underlying factors, including a different consumer mindset, with many consumers drinking less, but higher quality when in a bar or restaurant. There's also growth in takeout and delivery — both areas that negatively impact the beverage occasion — as well as increased competition from new channels in both retail and foodservice for the alcohol occasion." 

In looking at specific categories of adult beverage in on-premise locations, Henkes notes that beer remains the underachiever, with expected consumer spending growth of 2 percent. "Craft and imports are trending positively, but domestic beer, which still accounts for over half of on-premise beer volume, remains challenged," he said.

Spending on spirits is expected to grow at a rate of 2.8 percent, the fastest expansion of all categories due to the popularity of whiskey and craft cocktails and the ongoing premiumization trend. Spending on wine is forecasted to grow at 2 percent, Technomic says.

Promoters, bar managers, bartenders, barbacks, servers, and security staff are essential positions that every nightclub operation needs to fill. However, having a dedicated director of marketing is crucial to a nightclub's success. What exactly does a marketing director or director of marketing do? Great question. Luckily, we were able to reach out to one of the best in the business who happens to work at one of the hottest nightclubs in the world - Intrigue inside Wynn Las Vegas - to answer that question for you. 

Steven Lockwood came to Las Vegas from Seattle to attend UNLV as an architecture student. After two years, he decided to take the route of fun versus being a studio rat. Lockwood says he wasn’t very good at school, and the only thing he really excelled at while there was throwing parties. After the first one he threw, Lockwood knew that this is what he wanted to do for a living. Lockwood worked in the UNLV entertainment department and passed out flyers on cars as a sub-promoter for another promoter. After turning 21, they started promoting for RA Nightclub at The Luxor. He rose through the ranks from promoter to VIP host very quickly. Soon afterward, Billy and Noey Richardson gave Lockwood a promotion to Promotions and Marketing Manager. After being there for three years, he moved over to Light Group to work for Sean Christie and Marklen Kennedy, where he helped open Jet Nightclub at The Mirage. Lockwood was there for four years when and was promoted to VP of Marketing for all the Light Group venues at Aria Hotel and Casino. One of his tasks was to book Tiësto, David Guetta, Usher, Katy Perry, Flo Rida, and Drake, among other top names in music. 

After a year at Aria, Lockwood decided to take a break and moved to Los Angeles to work for Matt Bendik at Voyuer. He grew into the Hollywood scene quickly and decided to spread his branches to work at Avalon Hollywood. He then opened up his night at the Bar 2 10 at The Beverly Hilton. After pretty much a year of tomfoolery and spending all of his money, Lockwood decided to move back to the scene he really knows and loves best: Las Vegas. Sean Christie hired Lockwood to become Marketing Director for Encore Beach Club and Surrender Nightclub, then promoted him to become Executive Director of Marketing for both venues before he took on that role and title for Intrigue Nightclub at Wynn where he is today.

When did you first take on the role of marketing director?

I was formerly marketing director at Encore Beach Club and Surrender, where I worked for the last five years before advancing to become the venues’ Executive Marketing Director. I created and spearheaded Encore Beach Club at Night (the Thursday night pool party). It was so successful that we added an additional night on Fridays…the only Friday pool party on the Las Vegas Strip, regarded as one of the best pool parties in the world. After last year’s season, I took on the executive marketing role at Wynn’s newest nightclub, Intrigue.

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Violence can absolutely destroy a bar or nightclub operation. When a bar is mentioned in the news due to a violent or deadly altercation, its demise is usually not far behind. Any time an atmosphere of fear is associated with a bar’s name, it becomes very difficult to attract quality guests and build a sustainable business. While it is impossible to eliminate all violence, it is entirely possible to minimize it by taking as many preventative steps as possible.

Consider these tips to keep your bar safe for you, your employees and your guests:

Security Starts at the Front Door

Strong lead doormen are vital for maintaining a safe environment for guests. Strong in this context refers to more than physical strength. Doormen must also be mentally strong enough to refuse entry to potential troublemakers. This sounds much easier than it is in reality. Strong security staff members know how to refuse entry to troublemakers and diffuse potential altercations with people who believe they are entitled to enter your venue. When intoxicated people feel any kind of emotion that resembles rejection, they can sometimes become hostile. This is where having a head doorman with quick wits and street smarts comes into play; vigilant head doormen can refuse entry to anyone. This includes every category of person who believes they have a right to enter, be it a famous celebrity, professional athlete, gang member, or a person known for drinking too much.

Despite the challenges presented by preventing their entry at the front door, security-minded staff know that doing so can save a tremendous amount of headache later on. Strong head doormen are much more than hosts or verifiers of the legal drinking age. They should know who is who, recognize faces from prior instances, and ultimately use this knowledge to control the quality of the crowd inside the bar. Strong head doormen result in safe environments.

Whether printed or emailed, many companies regularly publish newsletters in the hopes of getting customers returning for repeat business. But what differentiates an average newsletter that gets grouped with the junk mail from a great newsletter that earns its place in the “A” pile of mail? The content that a newsletter contains is the main factor that determines readership by those to whom it is sent. Plain, boring and vanilla content gets skipped over and tossed into the garbage with the rest of the junk mail.

To get your newsletter read, ultimately resulting in more guests coming into your bar, here are 3 tips for the best kind of content:

Your Views

People resonate strongly with others who share their views. Whether you have opinions about politics, sports, the battle of the sexes, or even just hobby interests, the values you communicate in the newsletter articles are often more attractive to guests than anything you could say about your food or drink offerings. This also applies to topics that you dislike. People that dislike the same things that you do will become more interested in your content when you voice your displeasure with those hot button topics in your newsletter. Whether they are good or bad, controversial and polarizing, when people know where you stand on issues, your newsletter stands out.

Event Calendar

August 2016 –Exposition Development Company, Inc. (ExpoDevCo) and Questex have announced the launch and partnership of the Pennsylvania Foodservice Expo, an annual trade show serving the Restaurant, Foodservice, Nightlife and Hospitality industry in Pennsylvania. The inaugural show will be held October 23-24, 2017 at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

The partnership and launch will incorporate Questex’s successful Nightclub & Bar brand by bringing the concept to the East Coast in a variety of tasting pavilions scattered throughout the show floor. “These new partnerships are extremely exciting, as they will result in the top minds from the restaurant, foodservice, bar, and nightlife industries all coming together in one spot,” remarked Questex President and CEO, Kerry Gumas. “By bringing together such complementary industries, the 2017 show and all those that follow will give attendees and exhibitors unlimited opportunity to take their business to the next level.”

The show will also be developed with the key support of the Pennsylvania Restaurant & Lodging Association (PRLA). “We are very excited to bring back the foodservice and lodging tradeshow for the Pennsylvania hospitality industry. By partnering with ExpoDevCo we can utilize their already existing foodservice show network and expand on that to bring our statewide industry together for an all-inclusive annual event,” stated John Longstreet, President & CEO of the Pennsylvania Restaurant & Lodging Association.

According to the National Restaurant Association, there are more than 25,434 eating and drinking establishments in Pennsylvania producing more than $21 billion in sales and half a million jobs.

For more information, visit www.PAFoodserviceExpo.com.

VIBE Vista Awards nominations will open Tuesday, September 6, 2016 for the 2017 VIBE Conference. The conference, known as the premier annual event for recognizing the leading chain and hotel adult beverage executives and suppliers, will be held in San Diego, CA, from February 27 to March 1.

The VIBE Vista Awards recognize the creation, training, execution, management, and ongoing positive results of national on-premise companies’ corporate beverage programs. Submissions are due no later than Friday, November 11, 2016. For more information on the 2017 VIBE Vista Awards, please visit www.vibeconference.com/awards. To view the 2016 VIBE Vista Award winners, please click here.

Nominations may be submitted by sponsors, consultants, agencies, distributors, suppliers and operators, and are judged on creating positive initiatives that spark beverage sales, innovations that contribute to operational efficiencies, and training and service programs that lead to the highest quality standards and operational practices. All submissions are reviewed by a panel of Johnson & Wales University beverage faculty, staff and alumni.

The VIBE Vista Awards recognize top performance in the Multi-Unit Chain Restaurants and Hotel, Cruise Lines, and Casinos divisions. The awards highlight programs and promotions in the following categories:

VIBE Vista Award benefits include::

The non-classified bottles from the region's Left Bank offer value, complexity and ageability.

Fact: Bordeaux makes some of the most respected and sought-after wines in the world. Another fact: A lot of it is out of reach for the average oenophile. But that doesn't mean that you need to pass over the region entirely. Skip the First through Fifth Growths (the Châteaux given status in the 1855 Classification) for wallet-friendly Cru Bourgeois, which offer a smattering of what makes Bordeaux great: namely structure, elegant fruit, and the ability to evolve over many years. As François Nony, vice president of Cru Bourgeois du Médoc puts it, "With our consistency and classic structure, we don’t see that many competitors who can offer the same for the price." In other words, these wines need to be part of any robust beverage program.

What are Cru Bourgeois wines?

Cru Bourgeois wines hail from the Left Bank of France's renowned Bordeaux region, and each is made up of mostly Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot grapes. What makes them especially sought after is that they have the pedigree of Bordeaux without the price tag. "These wines, secretly some of the best value in France, are more approachable and consumer friendly than that of the Grand Crus classé," points out Nony. Most of them are available from $15 to $50, a relative steal compared to the higher-end bottles of the region.

If Cru Bourgeois wines are value driven they must be mass produced, right?

Many people use the terms “fad” and “trend” interchangeably. Those words, however, have very different meanings. Fads have short lifespans while trends have true staying power. Whereas fads are discovered by influencers, receive mainstream adoption (usually after intense media coverage) and then die off, trends take much longer to be cultivated. Once embraced, trends put down cultural roots and grow stronger.

Just because a fad lives for only a short time doesn’t mean that they’re “bad.” Restaurants, hotels, casinos, cruise lines and other hospitality and service industry companies can certainly profit off of fads. The key is to not spend more dollars than the fad is worth. Fads aren’t normally worth a significant investment; in other words, proceed with caution.

Another thing to bear in mind is that some fads are worth leveraging even after they drop from the spotlight. While they may no longer be a craze, they may maintain enough popularity among enough people to still be worth a small investment.

Trends, on the other hand, are worthy of long-term investments of time (research and training) and money (orders, menu placement, marketing and promotions). Not only can embracing a trend attract customers, it’s expected of brands in order for them to be perceived as relevant. They’re also an effective way of engaging with customers in person and via social media.

As some experts have said, trends affect your overall strategy while fads affect your tactics. Similar to how fad and trend are often used correctly, “strategy” and “tactic” tend to be thought of as synonyms. A strategy is an overall plan (such as customer engagement); a tactic is a means of executing on that plan (Facebook posts, Tweets, Instagram videos, etc.). Social media is both a trend and a strategy; it’s the apps, features and how they’re utilized that are fads and, therefore, tactics. Does something that appears to be a cultural phenomenon or shift seem like it could influence a brand’s engagement strategy? Then it’s likely a trend. Will it more likely be implemented as a tactic to achieve goals within the strategy? It’s probably a fad. That isn’t an exact science but it’s one way people can try to identify the differences between fads and trends.

Everything we do seems to have an app that claims it will make our tasks simpler to accomplish. They promise ease of use, the ability to spend more time with customers and less time micromanaging employees, and deeper insight into all aspects of our operations. But which apps actually deliver on these promises? Take a look at these 7 apps that are used by big names in the hospitality and service industries.

Payment Apps

Android Pay

By now, we all know about Android Pay. Clearly, that speaks to the popularity of this mobile payment app. The benefits are simplicity, speed and security. Adding to that list are the ability for the app to apply loyalty points and offers automatically (at select merchants), and the number of locations that accept Android Pay.

Available for use at: Fuddruckers, Panera, Rubio’s

Beverage promotions can be tricky, especially when supplier partners are involved who may not have the same expectations as an operator. But the Omni Hotels & Resorts teamwork with the National Honey Board was built on a long-term commitment to more than just sales. The results won Omni the 2016 VIBE Vista Award for Best Special Event Program among hotels, cruise lines and casinos.

Five Omni properties with a collective 300,000 bees have been harvesting honey from their own beehives for years, using it in everything from culinary dishes to spa treatments. Starting in 2015, a collaboration was developed with the National Honey Board (NHB) to create custom-curated menu specialties that reflect the flavor of summer. Omni Hotels teamed with the NHB to create a special pool menu and promotion highlighting honey as the 2015 “Flavor of the Year,” launching in May 2015 and in place for three months at 56 Omni properties nationwide.

Inspiration for the special menu began during a two-day honey education, tasting and immersion experience at the Omni Amelia Island Plantation Resort in Amelia Island, Florida. During the trip, Omni chefs, NHB chef David Guas (author of Grill Nation and host of Travel Channel’s American Grilled), and Omni mixologist Kim Haasarud combined their collective expertise and creativity to create an array of honey-infused cocktails and dishes that were featured in the “Art of Water” poolside menu.

The cocktail portion of the menu is divided into five regions (Southeast, Northeast, Midwest, Texas and West), each featuring local and honey-infused cocktails. For Texas, the drinks included the Gold Blossom, Honey Grapefruit Lemonade and Honey Punch; in Western states: the Bee Sting and the Orange Blossom Margarita; in the Southeast, Wildflower Lemonade and Honey Grapefruit Crush; and in the Northeast, the Honey Melon Mojito and Tropical Honey Lemonade.

Omni worked closely with the NHB to ensure the honey was used correctly in both food and beverage. Rather than just adding honey as an ingredient, the two worked to trial and research using honey correctly. In at least one cocktail per region, custom honey water was included as an ingredient, adding an additional layer of customization. The Wildflower Honey Punch in the Midwest, for example, used housemade wildflower honey water. The Gold Blossom Margarita in Texas used housemade orange blossom honey water.

During the hot and hazy days of summer, when everyone’s feeling more than a little bit wilted, it can be too much effort to get out the cocktail shaker (first world drinking problem, we know). But seriously, especially this month, you want sweet relief and you want it fast. Enter the Rickey. This libation was created in the late 1800s at Shoomaker’s Saloon, a local watering hole popular with D.C. politicians. Lobbyist Joe Rickey used to start each day with a pre-work bourbon; one day he decided to ask for it topped with soda and garnished with a squeeze of lime, and the Rickey was born. (Today, a Rickey contains either bourbon or gin.)

In 2011, the tipple was named “Washington, D.C.’s Native Cocktail”. Each July the District celebrates Rickey Month, during which bartenders create their own takes (some of which admittedly stray pretty far from the original), culminating in a competition to see which version reigns supreme.

It really doesn’t matter: every Rickey is pretty much perfect. It’s built in the glass (i.e., no pesky shaker to look for) and it’s forgiving even if you’d rather eyeball the ingredients than measure them in a jigger. And its combination of spirit, citrus and effervescence is just what you need on that porch swing, patio or pool deck. As Lee Carrell, bar manager at The Royal in D.C. puts it, "[The Rickey is] light on sugar, refreshing with citrus and soda, simple to make and really just one of the best ways to beat the city heat." Start with the original, then up your game with one of these variants:

“Retox Detox” Rickey

Recipe courtesy of Denise Jauregui, Bartender, Jack Rose Dining Saloon, Washington, D.C.

Hosting events is one of the best ways to get people through your door. But if you don’t take the time to plan it out, get everything in place, and throw a good party, your event could take a dive for the worst and leave you owing more than you made.

Here is a 5-step plan to set you up for success when hosting an event.

1. Plan your event

We’re starting basic and boring, but planning is one of the most important aspects of throwing an event. You need to first identify what you want to get out of the event, then plan accordingly to achieve it. The best questions to answer during this step are:

Once you answer these questions, you have a better way of moving forward. You know exactly how many promoters you need, what staff members are responsible for, how much money you can spend on talent, what type of talent you need to hire, if you can offer drink specials – the list goes on.

Planning = Profit!

‘Tis the season to be planning. The holiday season and next year will be here before you know it. As you wind down the summer, build a time machine in your back room. Not literally, of course. However, you can mentally teleport yourself into the fall, winter, and even into 2017 to ensure that you have a plan for success.

A business owner myself, I learned the power of short- and long-term planning from the days I spent in a big brand environment. We spent hours creating annual plans starting in August and had formal meetings every week, during which we reviewed our goals for the upcoming week and months. Although that’s clearly overkill for businesses like ours, the discipline was one that I carried with me when I launched my own venture.

Because the bar and nightclub industry is ever-changing and transactional, you often can’t look beyond tonight. Staffing, inventory, purchasing, payroll, security, promotions and social media posts – those are all the things that are staring you down TODAY. How can you possibly be thinking about New Year’s specials or next spring’s outdoor seating?

Start now and start small. Here are 5 things you can do tomorrow to get a jump on the competition.