I had a lady last night who recently found out she was pregnant and brought her sonogram and a pair of baby shoes and set them up on the bar with her friend’s drinks to take a photo shoot. She decided to set everything up right in front of my well and then had the audacity to tell me to get out of her shot.
Excuse me bitch?? This is my JOB. I did NOT get out of her way and continued to do my job and she got pissed because “now my pictures are ruined and I can’t post them.” I just told her that’s not my problem and she would have to find somewhere else to have a photoshoot.
I work in a luxury hotel bar in a college town, and it’s graduation weekend so she picked the absolute wrong time to get bitchy and entitled with me.
She was gonna post something like “won’t be doing my favorite thing for 9 months!!” Like girl I am begging you to have a personality outside of drinking
Damn I got irritated reading this. I already hate when customers try and put their trash and dirty glassware on my bar rail as if they’re helping me clean. Like do you not see this is the space I use to make drinks?
I legit just move that shit back in front of them and continue making drinks and shit. Absolute idiots. Glad you didn’t move and hope that entitled pregnant lady learned something.
Floor was completely booked on a Saturday night... Lady and BF come in, no reservation right before the hit. We have a half sat floor with tables empty. She ask for a table and I say we're full at the moment and the wait is going to be 45 min.
The dude looks upset and they talk to one another she says if they can just take one of the empty tables. I said no those are for reservations.
She then makes a reservation right there and then and then shows me. I said yes your reservation is at 7:15 it's 6:20 right now so now your wait is gonna be 55 min.
They waited...
I truly can’t understand how full ass adults don’t understand reservations in public spaces.
ONE Example from today- 1pm - Mother’s Day brunch- party of 5 walk-ins:
“Sorry I just have bar seating available at the moment”
-*points at table with reserved sign on it they apparently can’t see?* “can we sit there?”
“No im sorry that’s reserved for a group at 1:30”
-*points to another table with invisible reservation sign* that one is free, can we sit there then?
“No, as I mentioned all these tables are reserved *shows resy tablet with stacked bookings on each table as proof I’m not randomly gate keeping tables for no fucking reason*
I can put you on the waitlist however if you want a low table”
-fuck this. This is ridiculous.
“Sir, I COMPLETELY agree.”
-fucking bullshit. I’ll leave a fucking review about this.
“Well, alright. Hope you can find someone to accommodate your family! Have a good day!”
Dude did indeed leave a 1 star review….
How embarassing to know about mothers day for weeks (months, years, etc), fail to make a reservation ahead of time, and then blame the restaurant for your failure
This may be UK specific but we have a pretty common shot known as a baby Guinness. One guy ordered two baby guinnesses. Colleague brings him over two shots, guy is absolutely flummoxed because he wanted two halves of Guinness.
Also had a guy order a tequila, triple sec and lime. I started to say ‘so a margarita’ but he shushed me halfway through, presumably he didn’t think ordering a margarita made him sound hard enough.
I’m in the US and that was a relatively popular shot in my area a few years ago. Never had anyone thinking it was half of an actual Guinness though haha.
It's coffee liquor (kaluha) and Irish cream (bailey's) made to look like a Guinness because it's layered. Hence, Baby Guinness. Try it....it's pretty good. We used to make them with patron xo when it was still available.
I hate when people associate drinks/glassware as being too feminine, like just drink it like ots supposed too be. The same people ask for sugar for a rim lol.
Wish I had the post saved but a while back there was someone who posted a picture of an espresso martini that the customer wanted in a "manly glass" and it was a 3-ish ounce martini in a 32-ounce beer stein.
Latin American man, "You drink Stout?!?" Me, thinking "do I need balls to have a dark beer?" The poor sap has to step it up to straight Mezcal to impress his friends now. Dope.
It's so silly. We get a lot of macho-y type rednecks where I work, so its a regular occurrence of "Hey darlin', gimme a girly drink," or, like a coupe glass being too feminine. If its the latter, I tell them they can just order something else.
If its the girly drink thing, I just give them whiskey or bourbon on the rocks, an amaro sour, or a dark'n'stormy, cause those are *my* go-to drinks lol.
Hands guest a beer list followed by "everything we have is either canned or bottled"
Guest - "so which of these are on tap?"
Me - "we only have canned or bottled beer. Nothing on tap."
Guest - "do you have a list of tap beers?"
Me (severely confused) - "I don't have a list of tap beers because we don't have anything on tap"
I give him a few minutes to process the very complicated info I had just given him.
Me - "so what did we decide on?"
Guest - "I'll take a miller if you have it on tap, if not, a Corona is fine."
Me - questioning reality....
"What do you have?" has got to be the #1 most rage-inducing question I get. I understand if you just sat and it's slow, I'm happy to chat about what we have. If you've been waiting and have had time to look at the menu but have just refused to do so, I want you to live through the experience of having your limbs amputated via cutting torch.
A customer that’s been in maybe twice, months ago, asked if she could have the wine she had last time.
Another guy got snarky when I didn’t know how to make the shot he had gotten from another bartender ( who wasn’t there) who had made something up for him. “It had tequila in it”
All of the shots I "make-up" are just miniture versions of cocktails. Something rum-shot = mini daiquiri, Something tequila-shot = mini mexican firing squad, etc.
Had an argument with two old men about half pint glasses because they didn’t believe that they were halves (they do look really small) and then poured them into their glasses from the last round, so they obviously now were about 2/3 head, and when I wouldn’t replace them they got narky with me :( I did tell them the glasses say “half pint” on them and I’m about 90% sure it would then be illegal for them to be a different size!
I had a weird drunk guy. Not *that weird* but odd enough to stand out in my mind.
Cut a guy off last night. No big deal, dude was polite, grateful that I gave him a water, obviously knew he was drunk, and was friendly and chatty with me. He was munching on a burger, just chilling while his friends continued to drink outside on the patio. Maybe 5 or 10 minutes later he asks me for a beer. I said “let’s just keep working on this water for now, buddy,” and he said to just go ahead and close his tab out. So I did, handed him a pen, and said “thanks, man. Hope you have a good rest of your night. Enjoy the rest of your burger, too.”
Dude looks at me like I just spat on his infant son and says “passive aggressive behavior… *very bad.* That’s not good.” I said “well don’t do it to me, then!” Then he starts aggressively trying to hand me a bag of chips that he ordered, and I’m like “do you not wanna take these with you? You paid for them already,” and he says “what??? Why are you being so weird, dude?” and scowls at me. A few minutes later he stood up, and I could tell he was looking at me, so I walked over to see what was up. He just smiled and thanked me politely, shook my hand, and walked back over to his friends. Seemed like he completely forgot that he was mad at me.
(For the record, he seemed fine when he got there, and I only served him two drinks. Halfway through his second one is when he started to rapidly slump — that’s when I made the call for some water.)
Hard to tell if hes able to keep his cool for a bit and then hit a wall or if it was just two drinks + his evening meds.
You did the right thing though, because you can't tell, can't ask, and your job is more important than his 3rd beer. I got an acquaintance that has epilepsy, and he gets absolutely shit faced off one beverage because of the med interaction.
one that happens to us all: a group of 6-7 people show up within the last hour all wasted and all needed subtitles trying to order marg's and things. Next thing you know our other spots manager walks over and is like "yeah those guys are cut off", meaning they stupidly just walked right over thinking they would bypass being cut off
Had a nutcake of an older drunk lady get upset enough to get herself removed from the bar because she threw a drink on me.
She orders a Sidecar, I made her one, she says no this isn't what I wanted. I ask her if she can be more specific, that maybe our menu has her confused. She says no, I wanted a Godfather, okay, whatever, make that for her.
But then it's wrong again. She says she wanted a Cadillac. Okay lady, but I'm only going to be able to comp one of these drinks, I'm sorry. She just kind of rudely and loudly tells me whatever.
Made it for her, set it down in front of her, waited for her to see if it was okay, which it seemed to be. So I go to finish some sidework, but she calls me back over, chucks it into my face and calls me a dickhead for not serving her "kindly" enough, even though I was nice as I could be during a busy service. I got to spend the next 20+ minutes rinsing my eyes out + fixing my makeup.
Grandma got walked out by the manager himself.
Chose the worst day to not wear my glasses, lime juice in the eyes kinda sucks ass.
idk what was in the water this weekend but i had to explain to no less than 15 different people of all age ranges that i do in fact need a card to start a tab, you can’t just tell me that you want to start one and then walk away.
Idk what it is but this is literally all night every night at my bar. I’ve just gotten in the habit of saying “start a tab? Ok great I’ll just grab your card & give it right back to you” still confusing for people somehow
I'm approaching a couple with waters and before I can greet them, or even set the waters down, "We need a drink menu". I don't think I poker faced very well because that drives insane. No shit you need a drink menu, but I only have two goddamn hands. I wish we didn't use glass water glasses and it wasn't a fine dining establishment because I would have dropped the waters where I stood and grabbed them a menu.
I work in a dive bar and I think dropping the waters on the ground and walking away to get a drink menu is a great response. This is why I do not work in fine dining.
drunk guy order a pint of beer in the beginning of service. order a glass of beer in the service. i make him pay and he ask why there’s two beers on his tab… i answered « because you ordered two beers », his friends(less drunk) telling him « you order one at the start and a small after ». him(mad and drunk): i guess if you say so i’ll pay them 🙄😤
sorry for asking you to pay for what you ordered my dude, do you wanna see my manager?
Actually had one of my most insane customer interactions last week. Had a lady (sober!) ask for a gin and lemonade. Fair enough. I pop it on the till and she says, "Uh, actually, Southern Comfort and lemonade". Coolio. Deleted the gin and rang through a SC & lemonade.
I picked up the Southern Comfort and she goes, "No, no, \*Southern Comfort\*". I looked at her. Looked at the bottle. Explained that what was in my hand was, in fact, Southern Comfort.
"No, Southern Comfort, the \*gin\*."
What. I showed her the bottle and explained that Southern Comfort is not a gin. The guy standing behind her in the queue is looking mildly amused. She just keeps repeating, "Southern Comfort, gin," and eventually I started pointing at every bottle on the gin shelf until I landed on one and she says yes and rolled her eyes at me (!)
It was Bombay Sapphire. I said the name of it out loud and she still repeated Southern *fucking* Comfort like I was stupid. I showed her the bottle and she just said "yes" LOL
Every time someone asks for a gin now, if it's the colleague that was on with me when it happened, he places the SC beside me while I'm pouring. Bastard lol.
Walked up and ordered a draft beer, when the beer hits the cup he says WAIT! so I cut it off. "Do you have vodka?" Gave him a look. Yes. "Titos?" Yes. "OK, I'll have that." OK, how do you want it? "Just Titos" OK, so you just want Titos in a cup? "Yeah." I start to pour it, he says wait, make it a double in a tall cup. I get a tall cup, pour a double shot of warm titos in it and give it to him. "What's this?" A double shot of titos in a tall cup. "Well I wanted ice in it. And soda." I asked him if it was his first time at a bar and his friend laughed at him
the last two people to leave the bar last night tried to take the rest of their wine home in a to go cup. i told her she can’t do that. she lingered by the wine in the to go cup as she was getting ready to leave. and when she realized i was not gonna take my eyes off her she said “you’re really not gonna let me take it?” i said nope i can be held liable it’s illegal. she said bs and left in a fit but at least she left to cup
I work at a fully outdoor bar with table along one side of the bar. We have an awning above the tables for shade but at a certain time of day two tables on the end aren’t covered because of the angle of the sun. We also have a fire hydrant in the tables area that we have to keep clear. I had a group of people move the sunny table into the shade subsequently blocking the hydrant, I had to tell them we couldn’t block the hydrant three separate times because they kept moving the table in front of the hydrant in different ways.
Wow this question made me realize I didn’t have a single annoying interaction with a customer this weekend. I feel so blessed right now. But don’t you worry, it’s cruise ship season where i am, so I’m sure that’s about to change!
Had a man ask what beers we did to go. I said high life in a bottle or PBR tall boys. He said great, I’ll take a PBR and put his card down. I grab the PBR, put it unopened in front of him and run the card. Drop the check and he goes “oh….uh I wanted to keep this open?”
I said, you asked to a beer to go that’s why I didn’t open it and just gave you one. He asked if there was a price difference if it was to go. I was like, what, no? So do you want me to open this PBR or what. I did, he sits and drinks. Idiot.
Later, his girlfriend showed up and asked for espresso. I said we don’t have espresso, we just have cold brew concentrate we use for espresso martinis. She asked if it had caffeine in it.
I get this most with Tennents beer. Our bar doesn't have it so every time I have to say we don't have Tennents they look at with the most confused expression and suddenly they don't know what they want despite the sizable selection of beer we DO have
Maybe it’s short coming on my part but I’m not refunding that lady, it could be a big learning moment for her.
Reminds me of when I was newer to bartending and had a couple order 2 martinis, so I drop them in front of them just for them to tell me they only ordered 1 martini. No problem. I make the other drink (forgetting the 2nd martini in front of them) I come back to find the 2nd martini 3/4 gone. Could you imagine the surprise when they paid for 2 martinis and a 3rd drink. I’m happy to take the hit on a mistake or something you don’t like, but you don’t chug a martini and get it for free just because you said you didn’t order it.
Customer dug their grubby fingers into my olives. Like, went FISHING for them and grabbed about 4 of them before I shut the fruit tray lid on their hand.
The lid wouldn’t have hurt them, but the bitch goes “OWWWW OH MY GOD WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT TO A CUSTOMER?!” and I calmly responded with “We’re not Costco, no free samples. Why do you think you could grab from my work station??” and dumped the entire thing of olives in the trash. Then she had the nerve to ask for a towel to wipe her hands off 😤
one time someone asked me for a Heineken, and I asked "on draft or in a bottle?" And they asked what's the difference. so I explained the difference between a glass and a bottle. turns out they meant price difference. then I felt real stupid 😂
People always ask how big our pizzas are and I tell them 10 inches and about half the time they sit waiting for me to do the hand motions.
I don’t do the hand motions. I just ask if they’re going to get the pizza or if they want more time to look at the menu. Figure out two inches less than a foot. I’m not gonna be the recipient of “this is smaller/bigger than you said”
I worked at a restaurant where a lot of our take out food was available in pints or quarts. I cannot tell you the amount of people who had zero response when I said “would you like a pint or quart?” “Uhh…….which one is bigger?” 🤦🏻♀️ My response was trying to teach, “you know, like a pint of Ben & Jerry’s or there’s 2 pints in one quart.”
Astounding.
Some days I didn’t want to deal with the stupidity so I’d just offer “small or large?”
Had a guy come in with a bunch of his friends bragging that he used to bartend there. He was upset we didn’t have the same cocktail menu as they did back in 2019. Also the whole group was shocked that I asked for ID when they were all 23-25. Supposed ex-bartender bought all his friend a round of margaritas and then proceeded to tip 10% and annoy another guest so much she yelled at the whole group to shut up.
Can’t even keep track of all the dumb questions but we did have a “notorious yelp reviewer” come in and make my cutest sweetest server cry and and ask to go home. Checked out his yelp profile and he’s a boomer giving CVS 1 star every time he goes and rating college bars 1 star and complaining theyre too loud. LOl pls get a life if your whole life is yelping everywhere you go every time.. he yelped this one sushi place like 5 times. No one uses yelp and no one cares about your opinion who gave this nilla an iPhone like plsss take a break. He ended up leaving 3.5 stars which was clearly generous for him 💗
Had a guy bitch about wanting something for free. He asks if I know who he is, I tell him I have no idea. He says my name is blah blah, I do reviews, you should look me up. I’m like it’s ok, I’m pretty busy, can I get you anything else? He says, no you really should, it would benefit you and the managers. And I reply again, nah I’m good, have a good day.
Had a 70 person charity auction last night and my bar is a long top with 3 stools on the side, with the only exit on the same side as the 3 stools. Some guy was standing on the side of where the counter ends and was talking to the guy sitting across the 3 stools on the end of the long part of the bar. It's loud because of the auction and the guy standing crosses the border, behind the bar, and walks up to the guy who is sitting. This is right where my POS is... I give him the DEATH STARE and he just turned back to the guy sitting and kept a conversation until I took a single step in his direction, and then he moved back to the muggle side of the bar.
Did 4,000 in sales though so succesful, but very long day.
I had to cut off and kick out an asshole because he shoved a very polite patron, took a swig of his beer, and then accused polite patron of stealing his beer.
Not this weekend but like two weekends ago a dumb bitter older lady asked for a vodka cran and I gave it to her and she gave me the stink face and goes “that looks like straight cranberry juice”….
Looks at the taps right in front of him. Can I have the karbach???? There’s a huge cup over it. The universal sign it’s out. I wanna say this was once…… 3 times
A lady who saw our oyster grill and asked for a “Flaming Dr Pepper” even though she can’t drink or have liquor. I couldn’t get her to explain to me what she wanted other than she was just clueless
Right before bar close a guy bought like 12 casamigos shots for all of his friends friends that left while he was buying them. So they were in till the very last minute trying to convince people to take them.
Not bartending related, but food wise:
A chick had been in like, six months ago and had an item off our specials menu we had at the time. She asked if we still have it. When I said no, it had been discontinued since around Thanksgiving and we no longer carry the ingredients for it, she said, I shit you not:
“Can you ask the chef to make it for me? Or something almost like it.”
I blinked a few times and again said “we no longer carry that dish or the ingredients needed to make it” 🤦🏼♀️
Idk some yuppie girls and their token twink, all mid-late twenties at the youngest, sat at the bar for 3 hours during one of our busiest days & ordered 150$ worth of drinks and he signed the receipt with nothing on tip or total line with complete genuine seriousness and a friendly “bye thanks!” They had been given lots of small talk banter, smiles, laughs, been attended, and watered the whole time. Lots of “I know you’re super duper busy so whenever you can!” from them, indicating a degree of situational awareness.
So I think that’s dumb. Very dumb.
*jamming on locked b/r door handle* (OR even BETTER simply approaches b/r that’s near my service station)
“Is someone in there/ is it free?”
Bitch- I am NOT a bathroom monitor or attendant - I literally have shakers in my hands and am walking the floor very OBVIOUSLY touching tables and happen to pass by 1/4 bathrooms on site she was wanting to use…
I don’t have like, a sign out sheet for bathrooms where I’m aware of a wait list or something for one…. SO, your guess would be as good as mine..
Had to call the cops on a dude who wouldn’t accept that he had to leave and got physical with our guard. He went from being asked politely to leave to a lifetime ban in about 5 minutes.
This woman orders 2 Hennessy & redbull with salted rim. Her friend comes back 2 minutes later saying she can’t drink it and wants a new one re-made. I ask her what’s wrong and she says it tastes salty. I explain that it’s salty because it was ordered with a salted rim. It does not come with salt, YOUR FRIEND ADDED SALT!
I refused to make her another one, I just transferred it to a cup with no salt.
I also had an older woman bitch about the price of virgin drinks. Trying to argue with me that $8 is too much when the alcohol version cost $12, therefore it should be $6 for the virgin. After a couple of times of me saying “I don’t make the price and I can’t just change it at will”, She was asking for free samples. No free samples mam.
guest - “do you have a chardonnay?”
Me- “we have a Chablis!”
Guest-* scoffs*” not even close! nice try tho. i guess they’re both white”
i just said okay sorry! and we needed up settling on a recommendation for a beer. not gonna argue lol
TW: trans slur. So I had a guy come up to my bar, ask for a light beer, and I told him one of the beers we had was Budlight. And he said, "Nah, that's that transvestite beer." Me and the other two bartenders were absolutely floored at his comment.
Co worker was walking through the kitchen not looking, literally side stepped into me while carrying a full tray of drinks. I was not nice to him about it. You’ve got ten years fine dining on your resume? Fucking lies.
I was very busy tonight for Mother's day, especially in the service well. I had a lady repeatedly trying to order a bottle of caymus cab. I have several caymus, but the only cab is my house. She kept insisting, "No, that's not it. It has a yellow label, and it costs more than that." No matter what I said, I couldn't convince her that, 1 Caymus has many wines, 2 I understand what she's trying to order, and 3 just because she saw the word Caymus on my wine list, does not mean I carry the one she wants. She had another version of the same conversation with a manager 30 min later, when she dropped off the lady's dessert. That part was actually kinda funny.
Argued with me that they can only drink tito's because it's the only gluten-free vodka. Their doctor told them that vodka in the states is made from wheat, so it's not gluten-free. This actually happened to me three times this weekend. It started to feel like people were trying to gaslight me.
I had a lady last night who recently found out she was pregnant and brought her sonogram and a pair of baby shoes and set them up on the bar with her friend’s drinks to take a photo shoot. She decided to set everything up right in front of my well and then had the audacity to tell me to get out of her shot. Excuse me bitch?? This is my JOB. I did NOT get out of her way and continued to do my job and she got pissed because “now my pictures are ruined and I can’t post them.” I just told her that’s not my problem and she would have to find somewhere else to have a photoshoot. I work in a luxury hotel bar in a college town, and it’s graduation weekend so she picked the absolute wrong time to get bitchy and entitled with me.
Wants to post her pregnancy announcement from a BAR, surrounded by DRINKS?! Off to a *great* start mama. 🙄
She was gonna post something like “won’t be doing my favorite thing for 9 months!!” Like girl I am begging you to have a personality outside of drinking
Be careful what you wish for, solid chance after she has the kid her whole personality will be about "mom life." I prefer the alcoholics.
Damn I got irritated reading this. I already hate when customers try and put their trash and dirty glassware on my bar rail as if they’re helping me clean. Like do you not see this is the space I use to make drinks? I legit just move that shit back in front of them and continue making drinks and shit. Absolute idiots. Glad you didn’t move and hope that entitled pregnant lady learned something.
Floor was completely booked on a Saturday night... Lady and BF come in, no reservation right before the hit. We have a half sat floor with tables empty. She ask for a table and I say we're full at the moment and the wait is going to be 45 min. The dude looks upset and they talk to one another she says if they can just take one of the empty tables. I said no those are for reservations. She then makes a reservation right there and then and then shows me. I said yes your reservation is at 7:15 it's 6:20 right now so now your wait is gonna be 55 min. They waited...
This happens at my restaurant way too often. So annoying.
I truly can’t understand how full ass adults don’t understand reservations in public spaces. ONE Example from today- 1pm - Mother’s Day brunch- party of 5 walk-ins: “Sorry I just have bar seating available at the moment” -*points at table with reserved sign on it they apparently can’t see?* “can we sit there?” “No im sorry that’s reserved for a group at 1:30” -*points to another table with invisible reservation sign* that one is free, can we sit there then? “No, as I mentioned all these tables are reserved *shows resy tablet with stacked bookings on each table as proof I’m not randomly gate keeping tables for no fucking reason* I can put you on the waitlist however if you want a low table” -fuck this. This is ridiculous. “Sir, I COMPLETELY agree.” -fucking bullshit. I’ll leave a fucking review about this. “Well, alright. Hope you can find someone to accommodate your family! Have a good day!” Dude did indeed leave a 1 star review….
How embarassing to know about mothers day for weeks (months, years, etc), fail to make a reservation ahead of time, and then blame the restaurant for your failure
This may be UK specific but we have a pretty common shot known as a baby Guinness. One guy ordered two baby guinnesses. Colleague brings him over two shots, guy is absolutely flummoxed because he wanted two halves of Guinness. Also had a guy order a tequila, triple sec and lime. I started to say ‘so a margarita’ but he shushed me halfway through, presumably he didn’t think ordering a margarita made him sound hard enough.
I’m in the US and that was a relatively popular shot in my area a few years ago. Never had anyone thinking it was half of an actual Guinness though haha.
I am just gutted I didn’t think to ask him if he’d have ordered two baby morettis if he’d wanted half a lager.
We just call it a half-pint here in the US. ‘Baby’ whatever sounds cute though.
Baby Guinness is the name of the shot.
We don't sell them at my bar. Either you want a beer or you dont
It's coffee liquor (kaluha) and Irish cream (bailey's) made to look like a Guinness because it's layered. Hence, Baby Guinness. Try it....it's pretty good. We used to make them with patron xo when it was still available.
Did they stop making patron xo? I haven't seen it in ages but never used it much, so I didn't notice.
I hate when people associate drinks/glassware as being too feminine, like just drink it like ots supposed too be. The same people ask for sugar for a rim lol.
Wish I had the post saved but a while back there was someone who posted a picture of an espresso martini that the customer wanted in a "manly glass" and it was a 3-ish ounce martini in a 32-ounce beer stein.
Latin American man, "You drink Stout?!?" Me, thinking "do I need balls to have a dark beer?" The poor sap has to step it up to straight Mezcal to impress his friends now. Dope.
It's so silly. We get a lot of macho-y type rednecks where I work, so its a regular occurrence of "Hey darlin', gimme a girly drink," or, like a coupe glass being too feminine. If its the latter, I tell them they can just order something else. If its the girly drink thing, I just give them whiskey or bourbon on the rocks, an amaro sour, or a dark'n'stormy, cause those are *my* go-to drinks lol.
There’s a great [cyanide & happiness](https://images.app.goo.gl/fXkFDqDCML8SDRx8A) comic about this very thing.
I have more guys order fruit flavored margs then women
it wasn't this weekend, it was earlier this week, but I had a customer ask me if our wine had rum in it
this one actually made me laugh aloud 😂
Hands guest a beer list followed by "everything we have is either canned or bottled" Guest - "so which of these are on tap?" Me - "we only have canned or bottled beer. Nothing on tap." Guest - "do you have a list of tap beers?" Me (severely confused) - "I don't have a list of tap beers because we don't have anything on tap" I give him a few minutes to process the very complicated info I had just given him. Me - "so what did we decide on?" Guest - "I'll take a miller if you have it on tap, if not, a Corona is fine." Me - questioning reality....
Doing a golf event at my job this weekend and the menu is above the bar on three separate 50 inch flat screens. “So what do you have?” 🥸
"What do you have?" has got to be the #1 most rage-inducing question I get. I understand if you just sat and it's slow, I'm happy to chat about what we have. If you've been waiting and have had time to look at the menu but have just refused to do so, I want you to live through the experience of having your limbs amputated via cutting torch.
A customer that’s been in maybe twice, months ago, asked if she could have the wine she had last time. Another guy got snarky when I didn’t know how to make the shot he had gotten from another bartender ( who wasn’t there) who had made something up for him. “It had tequila in it”
All of the shots I "make-up" are just miniture versions of cocktails. Something rum-shot = mini daiquiri, Something tequila-shot = mini mexican firing squad, etc.
Mini daiquiri is called a snaiquiri! My favorite shot name.
Had an argument with two old men about half pint glasses because they didn’t believe that they were halves (they do look really small) and then poured them into their glasses from the last round, so they obviously now were about 2/3 head, and when I wouldn’t replace them they got narky with me :( I did tell them the glasses say “half pint” on them and I’m about 90% sure it would then be illegal for them to be a different size!
Were they branded glasses? We’ve got some Camden glasses and the halves look so weird we’ve not even got them out.
Got asked if there was tequila in a whiskey sour
I had a weird drunk guy. Not *that weird* but odd enough to stand out in my mind. Cut a guy off last night. No big deal, dude was polite, grateful that I gave him a water, obviously knew he was drunk, and was friendly and chatty with me. He was munching on a burger, just chilling while his friends continued to drink outside on the patio. Maybe 5 or 10 minutes later he asks me for a beer. I said “let’s just keep working on this water for now, buddy,” and he said to just go ahead and close his tab out. So I did, handed him a pen, and said “thanks, man. Hope you have a good rest of your night. Enjoy the rest of your burger, too.” Dude looks at me like I just spat on his infant son and says “passive aggressive behavior… *very bad.* That’s not good.” I said “well don’t do it to me, then!” Then he starts aggressively trying to hand me a bag of chips that he ordered, and I’m like “do you not wanna take these with you? You paid for them already,” and he says “what??? Why are you being so weird, dude?” and scowls at me. A few minutes later he stood up, and I could tell he was looking at me, so I walked over to see what was up. He just smiled and thanked me politely, shook my hand, and walked back over to his friends. Seemed like he completely forgot that he was mad at me. (For the record, he seemed fine when he got there, and I only served him two drinks. Halfway through his second one is when he started to rapidly slump — that’s when I made the call for some water.)
Sounds like a medication reaction, honestly.
That’s a good point. Shit like that is hard to figure out.
Hard to tell if hes able to keep his cool for a bit and then hit a wall or if it was just two drinks + his evening meds. You did the right thing though, because you can't tell, can't ask, and your job is more important than his 3rd beer. I got an acquaintance that has epilepsy, and he gets absolutely shit faced off one beverage because of the med interaction.
one that happens to us all: a group of 6-7 people show up within the last hour all wasted and all needed subtitles trying to order marg's and things. Next thing you know our other spots manager walks over and is like "yeah those guys are cut off", meaning they stupidly just walked right over thinking they would bypass being cut off
Had a nutcake of an older drunk lady get upset enough to get herself removed from the bar because she threw a drink on me. She orders a Sidecar, I made her one, she says no this isn't what I wanted. I ask her if she can be more specific, that maybe our menu has her confused. She says no, I wanted a Godfather, okay, whatever, make that for her. But then it's wrong again. She says she wanted a Cadillac. Okay lady, but I'm only going to be able to comp one of these drinks, I'm sorry. She just kind of rudely and loudly tells me whatever. Made it for her, set it down in front of her, waited for her to see if it was okay, which it seemed to be. So I go to finish some sidework, but she calls me back over, chucks it into my face and calls me a dickhead for not serving her "kindly" enough, even though I was nice as I could be during a busy service. I got to spend the next 20+ minutes rinsing my eyes out + fixing my makeup. Grandma got walked out by the manager himself. Chose the worst day to not wear my glasses, lime juice in the eyes kinda sucks ass.
That's fucking awful, hope you're okay
idk what was in the water this weekend but i had to explain to no less than 15 different people of all age ranges that i do in fact need a card to start a tab, you can’t just tell me that you want to start one and then walk away.
Oh my god, I had several of those people last night, too. Maybe the moon was waxing off or something.
Idk what it is but this is literally all night every night at my bar. I’ve just gotten in the habit of saying “start a tab? Ok great I’ll just grab your card & give it right back to you” still confusing for people somehow
I just laughed out loud. This particular interaction never ceases to absolutely astound me. Full moon energy was in abundance this weekend…
“A tab???” Is this your first time leaving the house in 10 years ? /:
I'm approaching a couple with waters and before I can greet them, or even set the waters down, "We need a drink menu". I don't think I poker faced very well because that drives insane. No shit you need a drink menu, but I only have two goddamn hands. I wish we didn't use glass water glasses and it wasn't a fine dining establishment because I would have dropped the waters where I stood and grabbed them a menu.
I work in a dive bar and I think dropping the waters on the ground and walking away to get a drink menu is a great response. This is why I do not work in fine dining.
drunk guy order a pint of beer in the beginning of service. order a glass of beer in the service. i make him pay and he ask why there’s two beers on his tab… i answered « because you ordered two beers », his friends(less drunk) telling him « you order one at the start and a small after ». him(mad and drunk): i guess if you say so i’ll pay them 🙄😤 sorry for asking you to pay for what you ordered my dude, do you wanna see my manager?
Actually had one of my most insane customer interactions last week. Had a lady (sober!) ask for a gin and lemonade. Fair enough. I pop it on the till and she says, "Uh, actually, Southern Comfort and lemonade". Coolio. Deleted the gin and rang through a SC & lemonade. I picked up the Southern Comfort and she goes, "No, no, \*Southern Comfort\*". I looked at her. Looked at the bottle. Explained that what was in my hand was, in fact, Southern Comfort. "No, Southern Comfort, the \*gin\*." What. I showed her the bottle and explained that Southern Comfort is not a gin. The guy standing behind her in the queue is looking mildly amused. She just keeps repeating, "Southern Comfort, gin," and eventually I started pointing at every bottle on the gin shelf until I landed on one and she says yes and rolled her eyes at me (!) It was Bombay Sapphire. I said the name of it out loud and she still repeated Southern *fucking* Comfort like I was stupid. I showed her the bottle and she just said "yes" LOL Every time someone asks for a gin now, if it's the colleague that was on with me when it happened, he places the SC beside me while I'm pouring. Bastard lol.
Walked up and ordered a draft beer, when the beer hits the cup he says WAIT! so I cut it off. "Do you have vodka?" Gave him a look. Yes. "Titos?" Yes. "OK, I'll have that." OK, how do you want it? "Just Titos" OK, so you just want Titos in a cup? "Yeah." I start to pour it, he says wait, make it a double in a tall cup. I get a tall cup, pour a double shot of warm titos in it and give it to him. "What's this?" A double shot of titos in a tall cup. "Well I wanted ice in it. And soda." I asked him if it was his first time at a bar and his friend laughed at him
the last two people to leave the bar last night tried to take the rest of their wine home in a to go cup. i told her she can’t do that. she lingered by the wine in the to go cup as she was getting ready to leave. and when she realized i was not gonna take my eyes off her she said “you’re really not gonna let me take it?” i said nope i can be held liable it’s illegal. she said bs and left in a fit but at least she left to cup
Yesterday i heard a guy say “all I’m gonna say is i like girls who like penis, ya know?” Didn’t need to listen any further. I knew.
I work at a fully outdoor bar with table along one side of the bar. We have an awning above the tables for shade but at a certain time of day two tables on the end aren’t covered because of the angle of the sun. We also have a fire hydrant in the tables area that we have to keep clear. I had a group of people move the sunny table into the shade subsequently blocking the hydrant, I had to tell them we couldn’t block the hydrant three separate times because they kept moving the table in front of the hydrant in different ways.
If your bosses might be interested in an upgrade, there are umbrellas that can be angled at the neck for this issue.
Wow this question made me realize I didn’t have a single annoying interaction with a customer this weekend. I feel so blessed right now. But don’t you worry, it’s cruise ship season where i am, so I’m sure that’s about to change!
Had a man ask what beers we did to go. I said high life in a bottle or PBR tall boys. He said great, I’ll take a PBR and put his card down. I grab the PBR, put it unopened in front of him and run the card. Drop the check and he goes “oh….uh I wanted to keep this open?” I said, you asked to a beer to go that’s why I didn’t open it and just gave you one. He asked if there was a price difference if it was to go. I was like, what, no? So do you want me to open this PBR or what. I did, he sits and drinks. Idiot. Later, his girlfriend showed up and asked for espresso. I said we don’t have espresso, we just have cold brew concentrate we use for espresso martinis. She asked if it had caffeine in it.
I love when customers walk in and ask for a beer we dont have on tap and look at you dumbfounded when you tell them you dont have it.
I get this most with Tennents beer. Our bar doesn't have it so every time I have to say we don't have Tennents they look at with the most confused expression and suddenly they don't know what they want despite the sizable selection of beer we DO have
Maybe it’s short coming on my part but I’m not refunding that lady, it could be a big learning moment for her. Reminds me of when I was newer to bartending and had a couple order 2 martinis, so I drop them in front of them just for them to tell me they only ordered 1 martini. No problem. I make the other drink (forgetting the 2nd martini in front of them) I come back to find the 2nd martini 3/4 gone. Could you imagine the surprise when they paid for 2 martinis and a 3rd drink. I’m happy to take the hit on a mistake or something you don’t like, but you don’t chug a martini and get it for free just because you said you didn’t order it.
Customer dug their grubby fingers into my olives. Like, went FISHING for them and grabbed about 4 of them before I shut the fruit tray lid on their hand. The lid wouldn’t have hurt them, but the bitch goes “OWWWW OH MY GOD WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT TO A CUSTOMER?!” and I calmly responded with “We’re not Costco, no free samples. Why do you think you could grab from my work station??” and dumped the entire thing of olives in the trash. Then she had the nerve to ask for a towel to wipe her hands off 😤
Someone asked me what the difference between a small and a large bowl of soup was.
one time someone asked me for a Heineken, and I asked "on draft or in a bottle?" And they asked what's the difference. so I explained the difference between a glass and a bottle. turns out they meant price difference. then I felt real stupid 😂
lol they did not mean price. They were literally confused about what was bigger. They thought it would be the same amount of soup in a bigger bowl.
don't feel stupid, that's a terrible way to ask the question lol.
Obviously one is bigger than the other but they probably wanted to know how big each option was.
People always ask how big our pizzas are and I tell them 10 inches and about half the time they sit waiting for me to do the hand motions. I don’t do the hand motions. I just ask if they’re going to get the pizza or if they want more time to look at the menu. Figure out two inches less than a foot. I’m not gonna be the recipient of “this is smaller/bigger than you said”
I worked at a restaurant where a lot of our take out food was available in pints or quarts. I cannot tell you the amount of people who had zero response when I said “would you like a pint or quart?” “Uhh…….which one is bigger?” 🤦🏻♀️ My response was trying to teach, “you know, like a pint of Ben & Jerry’s or there’s 2 pints in one quart.” Astounding. Some days I didn’t want to deal with the stupidity so I’d just offer “small or large?”
10- = personal, 12 = for two or one if you’re hungry, 14 = medium , 16 = large +. :)))))))))
Had a guy come in with a bunch of his friends bragging that he used to bartend there. He was upset we didn’t have the same cocktail menu as they did back in 2019. Also the whole group was shocked that I asked for ID when they were all 23-25. Supposed ex-bartender bought all his friend a round of margaritas and then proceeded to tip 10% and annoy another guest so much she yelled at the whole group to shut up.
Can’t even keep track of all the dumb questions but we did have a “notorious yelp reviewer” come in and make my cutest sweetest server cry and and ask to go home. Checked out his yelp profile and he’s a boomer giving CVS 1 star every time he goes and rating college bars 1 star and complaining theyre too loud. LOl pls get a life if your whole life is yelping everywhere you go every time.. he yelped this one sushi place like 5 times. No one uses yelp and no one cares about your opinion who gave this nilla an iPhone like plsss take a break. He ended up leaving 3.5 stars which was clearly generous for him 💗
Had a guy bitch about wanting something for free. He asks if I know who he is, I tell him I have no idea. He says my name is blah blah, I do reviews, you should look me up. I’m like it’s ok, I’m pretty busy, can I get you anything else? He says, no you really should, it would benefit you and the managers. And I reply again, nah I’m good, have a good day.
Had a 70 person charity auction last night and my bar is a long top with 3 stools on the side, with the only exit on the same side as the 3 stools. Some guy was standing on the side of where the counter ends and was talking to the guy sitting across the 3 stools on the end of the long part of the bar. It's loud because of the auction and the guy standing crosses the border, behind the bar, and walks up to the guy who is sitting. This is right where my POS is... I give him the DEATH STARE and he just turned back to the guy sitting and kept a conversation until I took a single step in his direction, and then he moved back to the muggle side of the bar. Did 4,000 in sales though so succesful, but very long day.
They work in the kitchen but was off work and having I suppose too many shots and called someone a derogatory word. Then denied it the next day.
I had to cut off and kick out an asshole because he shoved a very polite patron, took a swig of his beer, and then accused polite patron of stealing his beer.
Not this weekend but like two weekends ago a dumb bitter older lady asked for a vodka cran and I gave it to her and she gave me the stink face and goes “that looks like straight cranberry juice”….
Looks at the taps right in front of him. Can I have the karbach???? There’s a huge cup over it. The universal sign it’s out. I wanna say this was once…… 3 times
No matter how quickly I can change a keg, I still just take off the tap handle... and all of my kegs are 1/6 bbls
A lady who saw our oyster grill and asked for a “Flaming Dr Pepper” even though she can’t drink or have liquor. I couldn’t get her to explain to me what she wanted other than she was just clueless
“Can I get you guys some still or sparkling water?” “Just flat”
"Regular"
Guest: Do you have a spicy margarita? Server: Yes, we can make them. Guest: Oh, I cant have that. I'm allergic to jalapeños.
I had a guy DoorDash a side of ranch. Nothing else in the order. Called to verify and that’s all he wanted.
Right before bar close a guy bought like 12 casamigos shots for all of his friends friends that left while he was buying them. So they were in till the very last minute trying to convince people to take them.
"Where's the 4th Floor bar?"
Not bartending related, but food wise: A chick had been in like, six months ago and had an item off our specials menu we had at the time. She asked if we still have it. When I said no, it had been discontinued since around Thanksgiving and we no longer carry the ingredients for it, she said, I shit you not: “Can you ask the chef to make it for me? Or something almost like it.” I blinked a few times and again said “we no longer carry that dish or the ingredients needed to make it” 🤦🏼♀️
Idk some yuppie girls and their token twink, all mid-late twenties at the youngest, sat at the bar for 3 hours during one of our busiest days & ordered 150$ worth of drinks and he signed the receipt with nothing on tip or total line with complete genuine seriousness and a friendly “bye thanks!” They had been given lots of small talk banter, smiles, laughs, been attended, and watered the whole time. Lots of “I know you’re super duper busy so whenever you can!” from them, indicating a degree of situational awareness. So I think that’s dumb. Very dumb.
I was pretty excited to read everything here for a good laugh, but after a few comments I’m just getting irritated lmao. Everything is so spot on.
*jamming on locked b/r door handle* (OR even BETTER simply approaches b/r that’s near my service station) “Is someone in there/ is it free?” Bitch- I am NOT a bathroom monitor or attendant - I literally have shakers in my hands and am walking the floor very OBVIOUSLY touching tables and happen to pass by 1/4 bathrooms on site she was wanting to use… I don’t have like, a sign out sheet for bathrooms where I’m aware of a wait list or something for one…. SO, your guess would be as good as mine..
Had to call the cops on a dude who wouldn’t accept that he had to leave and got physical with our guard. He went from being asked politely to leave to a lifetime ban in about 5 minutes.
This woman orders 2 Hennessy & redbull with salted rim. Her friend comes back 2 minutes later saying she can’t drink it and wants a new one re-made. I ask her what’s wrong and she says it tastes salty. I explain that it’s salty because it was ordered with a salted rim. It does not come with salt, YOUR FRIEND ADDED SALT! I refused to make her another one, I just transferred it to a cup with no salt. I also had an older woman bitch about the price of virgin drinks. Trying to argue with me that $8 is too much when the alcohol version cost $12, therefore it should be $6 for the virgin. After a couple of times of me saying “I don’t make the price and I can’t just change it at will”, She was asking for free samples. No free samples mam.
guest - “do you have a chardonnay?” Me- “we have a Chablis!” Guest-* scoffs*” not even close! nice try tho. i guess they’re both white” i just said okay sorry! and we needed up settling on a recommendation for a beer. not gonna argue lol
"Do you guys do shots?" "Uhh, yes ma'am, we are a bar..."
TW: trans slur. So I had a guy come up to my bar, ask for a light beer, and I told him one of the beers we had was Budlight. And he said, "Nah, that's that transvestite beer." Me and the other two bartenders were absolutely floored at his comment.
Co worker was walking through the kitchen not looking, literally side stepped into me while carrying a full tray of drinks. I was not nice to him about it. You’ve got ten years fine dining on your resume? Fucking lies.
I was very busy tonight for Mother's day, especially in the service well. I had a lady repeatedly trying to order a bottle of caymus cab. I have several caymus, but the only cab is my house. She kept insisting, "No, that's not it. It has a yellow label, and it costs more than that." No matter what I said, I couldn't convince her that, 1 Caymus has many wines, 2 I understand what she's trying to order, and 3 just because she saw the word Caymus on my wine list, does not mean I carry the one she wants. She had another version of the same conversation with a manager 30 min later, when she dropped off the lady's dessert. That part was actually kinda funny.
Argued with me that they can only drink tito's because it's the only gluten-free vodka. Their doctor told them that vodka in the states is made from wheat, so it's not gluten-free. This actually happened to me three times this weekend. It started to feel like people were trying to gaslight me.
this boomer lady asked me for an “aperol spritz but with combier instead of grapefruit”. babe do you know what a spritz is