The hallmark of your bar is an original idea that can turn the bar into a super popular and super profitable place, it is something that distinguishes your tiki or speak easy bar from a million other tiki or speak easy bars. But one should not think that any idea will have a positive effect on the establishment: the history of the bar industry knows many failures.
Chips in Russian bars began to appear not so long ago, some 10 years ago in Russia no one thought about how to distinguish their institution from others. But as soon as supply began to exceed demand, it became clear that it was not enough just to open a new institution and serve high-quality alcohol and delicious cocktails in it in order to get many guests and a good profit. So competition pushed bar owners to be creative.
For the sake of justice, it should be noted that the first chips in domestic establishments were most often borrowed from Europe and America, because according to copyright law, ideas are not subject to patenting. It’s like with TV programs: KVN and Dom-2 are the only things that were invented in Russia on their own, the rest is just a tracing paper from Western television.
We have collected the most interesting chips in Russia and abroad. Now you can find out what to build on and what to adopt when looking for chips for your bar.
Top 5 foreign chips
5th place – Robot bartender
A restaurant has been created for high-tech lovers in Hong Kong, where instead of bartenders and waiters, guests are served and cooked by a real robot. He takes orders himself and sends them to the kitchen via infrared communication.
What can this chip give: reduction of personnel costs; the desire of guests to place orders more often in order to communicate with the robot again;
What to fear: the robot-bartender-waiter is not yet very accurate, can pour over or push the guest.
4th place – To scold from the heart
Somewhere in Spain, there is a thriving “curse bar”, its main feature being enjoyed by guests. The fact is that in the institution it is customary to shout and swear at the bartenders! The author of the most original curse is even entitled to a prize – a small glass of beer or tapas! According to the owner of the institution, it was conceived in order to reduce quarrels in families – let off steam on a bartender with iron nerves, which means there will be peace and order at home.
What can this chip give: emotional relaxation for guests, and as a result – the desire to come to the bar as a psychologist, at least 3 times a week;
What to fear: sooner or later one of the bartenders can not stand it, then everything will fall apart.
3rd place – Weeping Bar
In one Chinese bar, the main role is also given to bartenders, but here a slightly different trick is that in this bar guests are supposed to cry and talk about their problems. An hour session of tearful “psychotherapy” will cost $6. The Chinese restaurateur Luo Janu, after another crying drunk client on his chest, decided that such tantrums could be a good thing, and he did not lose! They say that at first, to justify their appointment, the bartenders used onions!
What can this chip give: this is a great way to make money on other people’s problems, because the services of a psychoanalyst are much more expensive, which means you can raise the price of cocktails;
What to fear: the fact that the bartender may be a gossip.
2nd place – Cocktail cart
The London bar “Connaught” surprises its guests with a “cocktail cart”: the bartender leaves his “kingdom” – from behind the bar and with the cart goes to the table, and in front of the guests, prepares cocktails! For a spectacular appearance, even a signature cocktail was invented – “Connaught Martini”, to which a guest can ask the bartender to add any of 30 different bitters.
What can this chip give: more guests will order cocktails, because to see the skill of the bartender you do not need to push at the bar – the bar comes by itself;
What to fear: too many “cart” orders, it takes the bartender much longer to prepare a cocktail in this way than for a regular cocktail, so additional bartenders will have to be hired.
1st place – Cocktail for a million
The Dry Martini Bar in Barcelona got its name for a reason, despite the fact that you can order any cocktail there – the Dry Martini keeps score. The bar’s feature is a counter hanging above the bar – each ordered classic cocktail with an olive at the bottom is reflected on the scoreboard, urging tourists from all over the world to make the counter spin.
What can this chip give: this popularizes the selected cocktail, while leaving the guests a choice, and practically guarantees that everyone will order it at least once a night;
What to fear: the fact that you can not reach a million.
Top 5 Russian Chips
5th place – Exchange in a bar
The work of the bar “Exchange” is built on the principle of trading on a real exchange. Georgy Rozanov, the owner of the Birzha bar, clearly explains the principle of work: “A trading session starts with an average price for all drinks. When ordering, for example, a serving of whiskey, the price for the variety that was ordered increases. All prices for other varieties from the Whiskey category are falling, the price changes after each order. The same happens in all other groups.” The bar menu has more than 200 cocktails and drinks, the “initial” prices for them can be found in the menu, stylized as the “Financial Times”, but on the scoreboard above the counter, the prices change every 2 minutes depending on the demand for this position. In addition, every evening there is a “stock market crash” when all positions reach the minimum value.
What can this chip give: fuels guests’ interest in cocktails and buying more; competitive spirit;
What to fear: electronics failure.
4th place – Suspended vodka
In the Art. Lebedev Studio’s Big Café, the counters are based on the old Italian tradition of leaving “hanging coffee”, but slightly modified it – guests hang vodka. This custom, which still exists, is even described in the novel Malavita by the French writer Tonino Benakvist: “… while relaxing in Naples, I heard about an old custom that some local bistro owners still honored. Considering the price of espresso at the counter (penny or less), it was not uncommon for customers to pick change out of their pockets and buy two coffees while drinking only one. And the bartender wrote down on his board one free coffee for a poor man who accidentally came in.
“Suspended vodka” has only recently appeared in a cafe and is still in experimental mode, and I must say, successful! Anyone can hang a glass of vodka of a certain brand at a price of 100 rubles per 50 grams. Some come and modestly hang one glass each, but there are also those who hang 4 pieces at once with a broad gesture. At the same time, no one, surprisingly, is not shy about asking for a free drink and it disperses pretty quickly. Of course, this feature also brings disadvantages, for example, a tramp has already visited the large cafe of Artemy Lebedev once, he ordered only free vodka, sat down at the largest table and did not want to leave!
What can this chip give: creates a joyful and friendly atmosphere between guests;
What to fear: what has already happened in Artemy Lebedev’s cafe once, that is, tramps and freeloaders who will come only for free drinks; you need to think carefully about how to carry out such purchases – in fact, the money was received at the cash desk, but the product was not used up.
3rd place – Universal bartenders
Roman Toroshchin’s establishment “Brut Bar” abandoned the usual bartenders and waiters, recruiting universal bartenders. All the staff at the Brut Bar knows all the cocktails by heart, can advise guests on something and, if necessary, even cook it! There are no waiters left in the bar, now the bartenders fill their role, and since the one who directly communicates with the guests is the main “seller” in the bar, it is very important that he is familiar with cocktails and can tell guests about them, and when he can still and preparing a cocktail – this inspires great confidence, and the guest will be ready to try everything that is offered to him.
What can this chip give: quality sales; increases the culture of drinking in the bar and introduces guests to interesting cocktails;
What to fear: growth in payroll costs.
2nd place – Time = money
In the spacious room of the “space” “Dial” there are areas with tables and soft sofas where you can drink tea, play board games, work or participate in interesting thematic meetings (the organizers arranged a crazy tea party on Lewis Carroll’s birthday – all the guests changed places every five minutes, drinking non-existent wine, dipping watches in tea and doing other crazy things) – and all this in itself is free, you only have to pay for the time spent in “space”: 1 ruble per 1 minute.
Each guest is given a vintage alarm clock at the entrance to keep track of the time. Ivan Mitin, the author of the project, is sure that Benjamin Franklin himself suggested the idea, but no one has yet been able to implement it: “He said time is money. I just decided to bring this idea to life. Whatever cafe you come to, you need to buy something everywhere, otherwise you do not bring any benefit to the institution, this causes insincerity between cafe employees and guests. You seem to have come to enjoy the atmosphere, relax in a pleasant place, but you have to buy something all the time and you are hinted at it all the time. You can buy nothing from us at all, or you can drink a hundred cups of coffee or tea, you can bring it with you.”
I wonder how evenings would end, for example, in the Free Bar, if they introduced a per-minute payment? Let’s try to imagine: for example, in order to remain profitable, a bar should, on average, bring in 100 rubles of revenue per day. Let’s assume that our bar has only 000 people per night, each of them can drink 100 cocktails per night. With the cost of a cocktail of 5 rubles, we will spend 50 rubles for each guest. Then, if the first hour costs 250 rubles (during this time, most of our guests will drink 1 cocktails), each guest will bring us 000 rubles net, total: 5. We will get the remaining money from guests who decide to stay longer, having made for them each subsequent hour for 750 rubles. Thus, our bar would be the first truly free bar!
What can this chip give: large straits, and, consequently, large sponsorship budgets and discounts on alcohol;
What to fear: the fact that fun can go beyond the boundaries and the bodies of guests will have to be carried out by specially trained people; besides this, the tax may not understand this chip.
1st place – Burn friends
The Old Fashion Bar, located in the Yekaterinburg Gallery of Modern Art, has two features at once. The first, which arose a long time ago, the bar is behind the closet, in the truest sense of the word! To get here, you need to know which bookcase door to pull. By the way, “Old Fashion” holds joint events with the gallery, then a personal cocktail is developed for a certain artist, which you can try during his exhibition. By the way, the name of the bar is really a cocktail – we remember the Old Fashion cocktail.
The second feature that Vyacheslav Zatsepilov introduced quite recently (and was the first in Russia and, it seems, in the whole world) is called “online bar”. Above the bar, he installed a camera that transmits what is happening in the bar to the official website, now any guest can watch the work of bartenders and the preparation of cocktails in real time from home. “The camera attracts a lot of guests who can spy on what is happening behind the bar. Some guests even manage to “thump online” – they call friends (mostly in another city or country), say the name of the site, sit in front of the camera and go … “
What can this chip give: can give a new advertising option for partners; more traffic to the bar website and, as a result, more guests;
What to fear: the fact that it will be more difficult to deceive friends or a wife, they can always turn on an online broadcast from a bar.
And in order not to overdo it with creativity, we advise you to get acquainted with the most terrible and sinister ideas that were once embodied in bars and restaurants. No comments here…
Top 5 Creepy Chips
5th place – Prison lunch
In a Tuscan prison there is a dangerous restaurant. For several days a year, it is open for gourmets: guests are searched at the entrance, their bags and mobile phones are taken away, they are forced to pass a metal detector (which did not cause even a shadow of embarrassment for a Russian visitor – football matches, rallies and even some metro stations tempered Russians). The main feature of this institution is that all the attendants are prisoners of this prison, who are taught to cook for a whole year before opening. They work under the close supervision of armed guards.
4th place – Drink at the dentist
Another unpleasant establishment is located in the Riga hospital, the dining room looks like a real medical office! The feature of this place is flasks and syringes instead of plates and glasses, the feeling that the menu of the restaurant is not food, but medicine does not leave!
3rd place – Serving in a bidet
There is a toilet-themed restaurant in China. Its feature is toilets everywhere! Guests sit on the toilets and eat from the toilets, by the way, the owners of the establishment even advise booking a toilet in advance.
2nd place – With a cocktail to the next world
In Ukrainian Truskavets there is an ominous restaurant in the form of a coffin, it is called “Eternity”. There is a sign in front of the entrance to the bar: “Entrance only in white slippers”, and “funeral” dishes have become the main feature of the menu, such as: “Farewell” sandwiches, salads “9 days”, “Wreath”, “40 days”.
1st place – Cannibal Banquet
And here, as it seems to us, the most terrible place! The “Cannibal Banquet” became a feature of one Japanese restaurant: a body is brought into the hall on a hospital gurney, which the surgeon waiter, in the presence of visitors, begins to dissect and lay out on plates. In the end, it turns out that the body is just a container filled with food, poured over with a red sauce that mimics blood.
Unfortunately, chips work only oncebecause an original idea cannot be original twice. You will have to come up with a chip for your bar yourself …