Serving the premium lager in a plain glass
Friday night, and there are no branded glasses left for your premium lager. The glasswasher is full, a tray was dropped at nine, and the last few went out to the beer garden and have not come back. Staff serve it in a plain nonic. A customer complains, because part of what they pay for is the glass. The brewery's rep, on a visit the following week, notices too.
Meanwhile there are three boxes of glasses for a cider you stopped selling last year taking up the shelf above the cellar steps, and nobody is sure how many half-pint glasses you have or whether the stemmed glasses for the Belgian beer were ever replaced after the Christmas party.
Why glassware keeps running short
Glassware is treated as part of the furniture rather than as stock. Nobody counts it, nobody records breakages and nobody knows how many of each glass the pub needs to get through a busy night with the glasswasher running. It only becomes visible when it runs out.
Supply is spread around. Some breweries supply their branded glasses through the rep, sometimes linked to how much you buy. Some come through your pub company. Others you buy from a catering supplier. Each has a different way of asking for more, and some take weeks. The request usually happens after the glasses have already run out.
Loss also happens in several ways at once: breakages behind the bar and in the glasswasher, chips that mean a glass should be thrown away, glasses that leave with customers, and glasses that break outside. Without any record, it all looks like one slow leak.
What running short of glasses costs
| Problem | Effect |
|---|---|
| Branded glass not available | Beer served in the wrong glass, customers and reps notice |
| No count of glassware | Shortages found on the busiest night |
| Breakages not recorded | No idea whether losses are normal or unusual |
| Requests to breweries made late | Weeks with the wrong glass while waiting |
| Old glassware stored for beers you dropped | Shelf space lost, money tied up |
Branded glassware matters to breweries, and it matters to customers who have chosen a particular beer. It also affects speed. Staff hunting for the right glass or waiting for the glasswasher at peak serve fewer drinks, and the queue grows.
Glassware tracked like stock
- We list each glass type with you: branded pint and half glasses per beer, stemmed glasses, wine glasses, highballs and any others, with the supplier for each and how you ask for more.
- For each type, you set a minimum you need to get through a busy night with the glasswasher running, based on your own experience.
- Breakages and chips are logged at the bar in a tap, by glass type, from the EPOS wastage buttons or a small tablet screen.
- A quick glassware count on a phone, weekly or monthly, corrects the figures and picks up glasses that have walked out.
- When a glass type falls towards its minimum, you get a note with the right action: ask the brewery rep, request through your pub company or reorder from the catering supplier, with the details ready.
- A report shows losses by type and by week, so unusual spikes, such as the beer garden in summer, are visible and can be planned for.
Brewery glassware supply is at the brewery's discretion and depends on your arrangements with them. We make sure the request goes in early and is recorded, not that it is granted.
A busy Friday with glassware tracked
Two weeks ago the report showed the premium lager glasses falling towards the minimum after a busy run of beer garden weekends. A request went to the rep with the count attached, and the new box arrived before they ran out. On Friday, staff have the right glass for every pint. The old cider glasses have been cleared from the shelf because the list showed nothing uses them.
- Enough of every branded glass for a busy night
- Breakages and losses recorded rather than guessed
- Requests to breweries and suppliers made in time
- Shelf space freed from glasses nobody needs
Does your pub run short of the right glasses?
- Beers are sometimes served in the wrong glass because the right one ran out.
- Nobody counts glassware or records breakages.
- You ask breweries for glasses only after they have run out.
- Boxes of glasses for beers you no longer sell take up space.
- Glass losses spike in summer and nobody plans for it.