For increased bar profits, train in upselling and Gratuity Secrets

For those of you that are currently employed as servers or bartenders, how would you like to substantially increase your tips? By pulling some recommendations from our Gratuity Tips course, you can do just that.

How much can servers increase their overall tips? For this example we will use a bartender at an low volume establishment. Let's say a bartender has 100 customers (total over 8 hours), and they each spend $8 (obviously not hard to do). Throughout his shift the bartender serves patrons who spend a total of $800. All of the customers leave a tip of between 10-15 percent (12.5 percent average). The bartender's total tip is $100, which is what he usually makes in tips. He relies on this because his base salary is usually less than his tips. If the bartender works an average of 5 shifts a week and maintains the same level of tips, he will make $26,000 in tips annually.

The same bartender increases his sales through suggestive selling, upselling, and customer service tips he learned through this course. By selling a more expensive drink, and having more satisfied customers that come back more often, his patrons spend $1000 each shift and his tipping percentage increases to 15-20 percent (17.5 percent average). The same bartender makes an additional $40 in tips on the first $800, and an extra $35 in tips for upselling his customers by $200. His total tip for the shift is now $175, which results in $45,500 in annual tips!

Servers fail to realize how much of a change they can make in their income with increased tips. In the above example, the bartender's increased income is equivalent to a $9.38 hourly raise by his employer. Of course the employer also received an additional $52,000 from the bartender's upselling. Any employee who can keep the customers happy and successfully sell the establishment's products can write his own ticket anywhere.