Mixability: Welcome to the cocktail school
Muddled by Mojitos? Bewildered by Bellinis? Confused by Cosmopolitans? Many pubs find cocktails daunting, but significant numbers are discovering an answer through dedicated cocktail training courses.
The Westbury, in Kilburn, North London, is one example. Here, licensee Jonathan Murray decided cocktails were going to play a big role in giving his freehouse a point of difference among tough competition. He enrolled his staff at London-based cocktail training school Squeeze to get them up to speed before the pub's opening in March.
Established in 2002, Squeeze's professional trainers run a range of courses for bartenders - from novice standard upwards. These cover the essentials of making mixed drinks, and the group also offers independent advice to pubs on cocktail offerings.
A pub, not a cocktail bar
Jonathan wanted to "be a boozer, a pub that does cocktails, not a cocktail bar that does beer". But an indication of how the cocktails have been received is that spirits sales have constituted 50 per cent of his drinks sales since opening.
Jonathan believes that it would not have been possible to achieve this without the Squeeze course - an investment that has more than paid for itself, he says.
Jonathan is happy to admit that he has little to no knowledge of how to make a cocktail - but his staff do, thanks to the training.
It all shows that, as a licensee, you can sell cocktails without being an expert. "I drive a car, but I'm not a car mechanic," Jonathan points out.
Success has been all about speeding up the mixing, and not being over-ambitious with the range. "The first thing Squeeze said to us was 'you are a volume pub, you have to make it quick'."
The four-day course has equipped 15 of his staff with the skills to make a decent cocktail in an average time of one minute. It helped them come up with a streamlined menu of eight long drinks, five shorts and four Martinis - and attractive descriptions for classics such as Piña Coladas and Old Fashioneds on the cocktail menu.
Costing and availability
The drinks were chosen based on considerations such as costings and availability of ingredients. Several of the menu listings finish with the catch-all phrase 'fruit flavours optional', which gives the Westbury the opportunity to come up with variations on the drinks using seasonal fruit.
The menu prices the cocktails at £7 each - a price point which Jonathan doesn't want the Westbury, as a traditional pub, to go above.
Squeeze helped Jonathan design the bar around a cocktail station, too. It is carefully laid out and positioned so that customers see the staff mixing the drinks. Again, this was important. "Half the attraction for customers is the theatre of seeing staff make their drinks," he says.
Indeed, the success of a cocktail offering is largely about presenting an image. Jonathan continues: "It shows you are thinking about your customers.
"There are nine pubs on this street and they all are all doing exactly the same drinks. So, if you're round here, and you have any interest in drinking something different, you will come to the Westbury."
