Is there any best practice "standard" way to organizing the shelves of a commercial bar?
July 2nd, 2009 | 
Author:
Are there are "best practices" or "standard" way that pro bartenders and high-end bars follow when organizing their liquor bottles on the bottle shelves? Figure about a 4-foot long area with 4 stepped shelves.
During parties we can attach 2 speed racks for 12 of the most used bottles and mixers, so exclude those and assume those would be filled with "extra" bottles of the most active liquors during parties. I am talking about the basic setup of what’s on the shelves BEHIND the speed racks, really what bars use to "display" what they have.
Is there any "preferred" or "pro barternder" way to organize those liquors on the shelves, or is it pretty much "whatever floats your boat"?
This is for a fairly large classy home bar with a lot of premium liquors, and honestly there are as many bottles underneath the shelves in Storage Cabinets as there are on the shelves. (Mostly the larger economy sized bottles of rum, tequila, etc., and the not-so-often used flavored liquors.)
It’s no big deal, but we just always wondered. Right now we just have the liquors on the shelves in a random order. But one day we were wondering whether professional bartenders organize their liquors in a certain "classic" manner.
Also, we usually keep our Vodka’s in the bar freezer so they stay nice and cold. Is that good practice or should we be displaying them too?
Yes, it depends on your biggest sellers. Here in Wisconsin, we ordered the bottles like this:
Brandy
Vodka
Whisky
Gin
7 Crown
Rum
Tequila
Scotch
Then, the odd liquors like Midori, Lime Vodka, Sloe Gin, etc…
Those were all "rail" brands.
For the call or top shelf brands, they were behind. So whisky, for example was Kessler’s for rail and Crown Royal for call. For Scotch, Dewar’s was the rail brand and then we had about five to seven single malts.
Also, pour with your right hand, mix with your left. Always! This makes for consistent shelving of the bottles when the bar is busy. Take a glass in your left hand, scoop it with ice and grab the mix gun while pouring the booze with your right. This is very fast and if you are consistent, it shouldn’t take you much more than about 5 to 7 seconds to make rail drink with two ingredients.
Posted in Home Storage Cabinet
It depends on the customer tastes. Some bars sell more rum and cokes or margaritas, so they keep those ingredients within easy reach. Of course the "top shelf" liquors are on the top shelf, easy to see to tempt customers (more profit).
If your customers are into martinis, keep those handy, etc.
I’ve seen bartenders rearrange the bottles to suit them when they start a shift so it is very subjective.
References :
Yes, it depends on your biggest sellers. Here in Wisconsin, we ordered the bottles like this:
Brandy
Vodka
Whisky
Gin
7 Crown
Rum
Tequila
Scotch
Then, the odd liquors like Midori, Lime Vodka, Sloe Gin, etc…
Those were all "rail" brands.
For the call or top shelf brands, they were behind. So whisky, for example was Kessler’s for rail and Crown Royal for call. For Scotch, Dewar’s was the rail brand and then we had about five to seven single malts.
Also, pour with your right hand, mix with your left. Always! This makes for consistent shelving of the bottles when the bar is busy. Take a glass in your left hand, scoop it with ice and grab the mix gun while pouring the booze with your right. This is very fast and if you are consistent, it shouldn’t take you much more than about 5 to 7 seconds to make rail drink with two ingredients.
References :