If you dread counting inventory, you’re not alone. Most bar managers find this to be one of the most tedious tasks of their week. We completely understand. We’re an inventory company, and counting bottles is our least favorite part of the job as well. We derive much more enjoyment out of crunching the numbers and providing you with the actionable data necessary to improve your profitability.
Unfortunately, it’s impossible to receive this valuable data without performing your weekly (or biweekly) inventory counts. So while this may be a tedious task, it’s still a very important one. It’s also a task that can become much faster and more efficient with a few simple tweaks to your processes.
Our Project 500 video series provides you with a wide range of tips and tricks that will help you cut your counting time in half. By implementing all of these tips, it’s realistic to be able to count 500 bottles an hour, which is about double what we typically see bar managers doing when we start working with them.
In a recent post, we discussed the ways in which you can implement the process of mise en place to improve the organization of products behind the bar and in your storage areas. Mise en place provides the dual benefit of improving the efficiency of your bartenders during their shifts and making your counting process faster.
In our experience, we’ve found that there are three key factors that will help you maintain your new order over time:
No matter how well organized you are, if you don’t communicate your organizational plan to your staff, there’s not much chance of maintaining this order long term. There’s always going to be multiple people involved in the inventory process and if they don’t understand your organizational plan, they won’t know where to replace each bottle after counting.
Labeling all your product positions will ensure that any new staff member will be able to come in on a busy shift and know where everything is without explanation. It will also ensure that whoever is counting your inventory each week will know exactly how to replace the bottles to maintain this order without any training. For this reason, labeling your product positions is one of the most critical steps you can take to maintain your established mise en place.
If you want to truly know whether you have a really well-organized bar, try this test:
Without labeling your product positions, it’s virtually impossible for someone without knowledge of your bar’s organizational plan to put everything back properly. But if you take the time to label each product position, anyone should be able to know exactly where each bottle goes.
Most bars will use a label maker to label the order of their bottles. The advantage of using a label maker is that your labels will look fancy and neat. However, there are several issues associated with using a label maker that make it an ineffective approach:
Instead of using a label maker, we recommend one of the following solutions:
The Steve Jobs biography discusses his approach to marketing. Apple products all had a slick and cohesive feel to them, and this was very intentional. One of his mentors in the marketing realm helped him understand the importance of having everything associated with your marketing look excellent. When your customers see your marketing materials and efforts look excellent, they automatically think other aspects of your business adhere to the same standard of excellence.
The same concept holds true at your bar. When your customers see that everything behind the bar is labeled and well organized, they will also assume that you’re maintaining these same standards of excellence in other areas of your operations – they’re more likely to think you’re rotating your stock better, preparing your food and drinks with greater care, and running a tighter overall bar.
There’s good logic behind this theory. In general, when you have high standards in one area of your business, it tends to spill over into other areas as well. Therefore, maintaining a high level of organization behind your bar will often raise the standards in other areas of your operations, helping your business run more efficiently and operate at peak levels of performance.
Labeling your product positions is the best way to implement mise en place. It will make counting inventory much faster, allowing you to optimize the efficiency of your inventory process so that your managers can spend more time on other important aspects of your bar’s operations. Plus, you’ll most likely find that you experience additional benefits associated with being well organized in many other areas of your operations.
Contact us today to find out how Bar-i’s inventory software can help you streamline your operations and boost profits. We serve bars and restaurants nationwide from our offices in Denver, Colorado.