From his windowless office at Chicago’s Voyeur Nightclub, manager Rick Lidstrom can’t see the bartenders, but he can still tell whether they’re pouring those $8 rum-and-Cokes too generously.
Microchips in the spouts of the liquor bottles generate a drink-by-drink record that Lidstrom taps by logging onto a Web site. His computer instantly shows how much his seven bartenders are serving.
The new system, called Beverage Tracker, makes the staff uneasy, conceded Lidstrom, who quickly added: “That’s the best part about it.”
The system, installed a few months ago, was a success from the start, he said. The club goes through less liquor, even as more people elbow up to the bar. Almost overnight the cash registers were recording increased sales, Lidstrom said.
It’s a high-tech solution to an age-old problem: Bar owners estimate that as much as 25 percent of their liquor is lost to “shrinkage,” which includes outright theft, overpouring, spills and poor accounting.
“Unfortunately, a lot of giving away goes on at bars,” said Kim Goodletson, a veteran bartender and instructor at a bartending school in Villa Park. “It’s been going on forever.”
Over the years, owners have tried many tactics, including spouts that control the flow, an idea that never went down well because patrons don’t like knowing their booze is measured out.
Another approach is the use of “secret shoppers,” spies who pose as patrons, sometimes using tape recorders that resemble cell phones to make notes as they check up on bartenders. One company, K.A.M. Data Services in Orland Park, provides such surveillance for 200 bars in the Chicago area each month. Bartenders have been caught giving away as many as 25 drinks in two hours, company president Keith McRae said.
“You’d be surprised what goes on when the owner is in the kitchen for 20 minutes,” McRae said. “Everybody acts like an angel when the owner is around.”
Lidstrom said the Tracker “is like having a secret shopper every minute of every night.”
Vital Link Business Systems in San Francisco introduced the high-tech bottle-bugging last year. Here’s how it works:
When a bottle is upended, a microchip in the red spout records how long it took to pour the drink, information the microchip transmits to a wireless receiver behind the bar.
Bar managers program which brand of liquor each spout is placed on. The software takes into account the viscosity of a given brand, which affects how fast it pours. Combining that information with data from the microchip, the Beverage Tracker program instantly determines how much liquor was served.
The amount, date and time of each pour are recorded. The owner can access the data immediately by using the software sold by the company, or by logging onto www.vitallink.com and entering a password.
The system also shows how much is left in each bottle and lets bar owners view their costs based on the brands of liquor served. It can even produce a report on each bartender’s work.
At Voyeur, 151 W. Ohio St., Lidstrom periodically compares the amount of cash in his registers with reports generated by Beverage Tracker.
With mixed drinks priced at $7 and $8, it’s a high-stakes game. If a bartender pours 1.5 ounces of vodka into each drink instead of an ounce, it can cost the bar up to $70 a bottle.
The system costs $5,000 to $7,000 to install, including the pour spouts, wireless receivers and software. Users who access the system on the Internet also pay monthly maintenance fees.
Lidstrom said the savings in liquor offset his initial investment within the first couple of months.
Doug Kisela, a bartender at Voyeur, said he and his colleagues weren’t thrilled when they learned about the tracking system. “It seems kind of Big Brother-like,” he said. “At first, I was skeptical. I thought they were just trying to scare us. … They keep an eye on you, that’s for sure.”
Voyeur management allows bartenders to pour free drinks to especially good customers, provided they limit the giveaways and record them.
Regulars at Voyeur were surprised to learn Beverage Tracker was monitoring their drinks. “As a regular, I should get a little more than the ones who come in whenever,” said Reggie Johnson, 24, of Chicago.
But a bar owner’s idea of a premiere customer can be very different. “If somebody is spending $1,000 on champagne, I don’t mind giving them a free drink,” Lidstrom said.
The Voyeur’s owners are also installing Beverage Tracker at McDuffy’s, a bar they operate on the Southwest Side. Spin nightclub in Chicago soon will add the system, and it’s being tried out at three Brunswick Zone bowling alleys in Naperville, Niles and Palatine.
Those Chicago-area bars are among about 70 nationwide that have bought Beverage Tracker, company officials said.
An additional 80 bars in the U.S. and Canada use Scannabar, which relies on bar-coded strips placed on liquor bottles. Within three seconds, the data is transmitted to a computer screen.
At Voyeur on a recent Thursday night, patron Carmelo Lopez of Chicago doubted that Beverage Tracker would change the age-old dynamic between patrons and their favorite bartenders.
“All the places are the same,” Lopez, 27, said. “Usually, you give [bartenders] a nice little tip and they take care of you the rest of the night.”
