At a time when businesses in the hospitality industry struggle to find staff and customer demands are rapidly evolving, operators have to innovate to stay afloat. Over the past two years, restaurants and bars have invested in technology to help improve their operations as automation has proven to help reduce labor costs and increase service efficiency.
While there has been a rise in self-serve kiosks among big brands like McDonald’s and other large fast-food chains, many small businesses in the restaurant industry are also turning to self-serve technology options. A trend that is rising rapidly is kegged cocktails and kegged wine. These self-serve options act as a way to satisfy customer demands and simplify operations.
Draft cocktails and wine have grown in popularity over the last few years, and it is no surprise that bars and restaurants are taking advantage of this new trend and its positive effects. Draft cocktails and wine provide operators with several benefits while simultaneously allowing customers to enjoy the self-serve experience. Operators around the world are using PourMyBeer’s technology to offer this unique drinking experience to guests.
Adding self-pour cocktails and wine to your establishment might be just what you need to increase your sales and customer satisfaction while decreasing labor costs. It is a win-win situation for both operators and guests. Below are the advantages that kegged cocktails and wine are bringing to establishments worldwide!
Consistency & Quality Control
Whether you choose to make draft cocktails in-house or purchase them through a distributor, each cocktail poured from the keg will taste exactly the same. If you choose to make your cocktail in-house, you have control over your cocktails too! You can fill each keg with one batch, which leads to higher levels of quality control when compared to a traditional bar where bartenders make individual drinks. At a traditional bar, each bartender puts their own flair on the cocktail. If a patron finds a cocktail they enjoy, they expect it to taste the same each time they visit your venue. The inconsistency that comes with having several bartenders can leave some patrons unhappy with the taste of their cocktail.
With wine on tap, there is no oxidation because kegs have an airtight seal. This means a glass poured on day one is just as fresh as a glass poured two weeks later! Bottled wine has a short shelf life, but self-pour wine can last substantially longer and maintain good taste.
Ability to Sample
With self-pour technology, every ounce poured is paid for by the customer, meaning no free samples. Guests love having the option to pour as much or as little as they want of each beverage at the wall. Your guests can try a variety of cocktails and wines to find the perfect one for their palette without having to order a full glass to figure it out! This is especially helpful when offering wine on tap since the customers become the sommelier and get to have their own wine tasting at the wall!
Sustainability
Kegged wine has become a rising trend, and one of the biggest reasons is thanks to the increased sustainability it provides. One keg is equivalent to 26.6 bottles or 120 glasses of wine. By kegging wine, around 39 pounds of packaging are saved from landfills each year since there is no use of bottles, corks, or packaging to ship hundreds of bottles. Reducing the use of bottles allows operators to simplify inventory and manage products more efficiently. With kegged wine, operators can position their establishments as eco-friendly, which is an attractive value proposition for customers and will likely increase foot traffic through your doors.
Increased Service Efficiency and Time
Self-serve beverages create a more efficient experience for both the customer and the operator. Guests can say goodbye to the days of waiting in long lines for drinks, and operators can save time and money! Kegged drinks reduce the number of operational tasks between a customer’s order and the service of their drinks – guests can go from door to pour in less than 60 seconds! Guests typically finish their drinks faster than they can be served by a bartender and are left waiting drinkless. With guests pouring themselves, efficiency increases which results in both sales and customer satisfaction increasing. Since all drinks get mixed in one big batch, staff members will save time and focus on increasing overall customer service levels, and operators will reduce labor costs.
Offering cocktails and wine on tap is a great way to eliminate service and staffing challenges and increase sales within your establishment. Many PourMyBeer operators find their cocktails on tap to quickly become their best-sellers. Malcolm Yards, a Food Hall in Minneapolis, MN, has found that their 32-tap self-serve beverage wall brings in more sales than their 48-tap traditional bar.
Adding this unique element to your establishment will allow you to provide a fun experience for your guests while increasing your efficiency as staff members can focus their attention on other important tasks. Join the self-pour cocktail and wine trend today to simplify your operations and boost your sales!
Contact the PourMyBeer team to learn more.
