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Service Animals
Welcome to Service Animals — where the untamed stories of the service industry finally get to speak.
Hosted by Christopher Connors, this is the place where bartenders, servers, baristas, flight attendants, hosts, cooks, and everyone who's ever worn the weary smile of service gets to spill what really goes down behind the scenes.
Some stories are wild. Some are beautiful. Some are so raw they’ll make your chest ache — and some will make you spit out your drink.
Names are optional. Truth is not.
So whether you’re still on the floor, recently escaped, or just someone who’s always wondered what your bartender really thinks of you… you’re invited.
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Service Animals
Service Animals - Ep. 2 - Colin
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Hello and welcome to Service Animals. I'm your host, Christopher Connors. Happy to be here. Joining me today is a first guest, most honored guest, Colin Summit. What's up Chris? Good to have you. I'm well. Thanks for having me on. Colin is a new entry into the bar I work at currently. You're definitely one of the most knowledgeable. Down to earth. People I've met in a while who worked this industry, so I appreciate that a lot. Thank you. Thank you. Just to refresh, this is a podcast for service industry folks, by service industry folks. We're here to tell honest stories and keep it funny and keep it real. So Colin, why don't you introduce yourself and tell us what you do and where you're from, who you're,
Colinyeah. My name's Colin. I'm originally from New Jersey. I worked in Morris County for many years. All different kinds of establishments, steakhouses, college bars, small little 13 seat dark restaurants. So I have a, you know, a good amount of experience in a bunch of different forms of bartending and styles of service that you can offer. So, plenty of hilarious stories as well to go along the way. How old are you? I'm 27 and I started bartending when I was 18. Sick.
ChrisYeah. I'm 37. What's been your favorite type of service job?
ColinThat's tough. I really love the the first bar that I actually started bartending at. I feel like a lot of bartenders feel that way. 'cause you know, it's kind of like the first time you kind of learn some of the industry secrets and tools of the trade. It's where you cut your teeth. Yeah, for sure. Exactly. Exactly. So it was like a small little, you know, I called it like a diner with a bar, but it was essentially a farm to table restaurant, but it was open from 7:00 AM to, you know, 11 o'clock at night. Nice. So you do brunch, you serve a lot of eggs, all that good stuff.
Yeah,
Colindefinitely. Definitely an interesting concept to work in and definitely a concept that changed a lot. So a lot of different bar menus and, you know, different chefs and different general managers, but it's kind of part of the industry as well, I think.
ChrisNice. Yeah, I agree. I think that first job is always the one that like you cut your teeth on so you kind of get a sense of am I gonna fit in this industry at all? Or what, you know, how do people treat you? 'cause obviously you're treated way differently when you're a new bartender at a first job that Oh, for sure. Than any other job subsequently. So yeah. That's cool, man. My first job was a tavern in Wisconsin. And I think that was the right job to get experience in. 'cause literally it's just, I was walking down the street from my mom's house to like the local Irish pub kind of. And then the owners have been there for 40 years and their daughter bartended. So it's really family oriented. And regulars are just the ones who stumble in and live down the street and order the same shit every time. So it's not like that strenuous thinking wise. But this
Colinis in Madison, right?
ChrisNo, that was in outside of Milwaukee. Okay. That's where I'm from. Yeah. Okay.
ColinInteresting. But you also worked in Madison? Yeah. Yeah. I got to Madison,
Chrislike I got outta college and had my degree and didn't know what to do, and then I was like, I'll work at a GameStop. Or you know, oh, I wanted to be a bartender earlier in life. Maybe I'll try that out. So I want that route and I'm glad I did.
ColinYeah. And what made you walk into that tavern and maybe you want to be a bartender. What was the, you know, spark that was like, oh, I think this is something that I want to do for work? Right. Because a lot of people, it's not necessarily a career Yeah. Right off the bat, but they're like. You know, why do I wanna work here? What is appealing about this to me? So, you know, what was it about that tavern?
ChrisThat's a great question. It wasn't the tavern per se. I think it was 'cause both my parents had been bartenders. My dad was a bartender in Atlantic City, ocean City New Jersey. And then my mom was in Miami. So they both like really came from it. And when I was younger I saw the movie cocktail. We all know that, right? We have to. I've actually never seen Cocktail. No. Come on dude. Oh, I've never seen Cocktail Man. We gotta seen, I actually refuse to watch it. What?
ColinThis is nonsense. I hate anyone who orders a Cuba Libre, so I can't even sit through the scene. I literally. Agree with you on that, but
ChrisI can't stomach that. You haven't seen the best bartending movie ever made. It's, lemme know when it gets on Netflix and I'll Yeah. Right. No we'll do a show. I actually have to cancel this episode. I can't even talk to you anymore. This is pretty cool. Nine years of bartending experience. Not a bartender. Yeah, not actually a bartender to you. Watch this, but I grew up on it, on VHS and I just had this romanticism about what the lifestyle could be and like, you know, all that. I mean come on, Tom Cruise. Young women very handsome. Young Tom Cruise and just and the, he's got a center tooth too. A centered tooth. Yeah. He's
Colingot a fucked up grill. Yeah. Yeah. A hundred percent. What does that mean? So you know how most people have a line in the middle of their teeth? He has a tooth in the middle of his face. If you were to draw a line down the, he has the middle tooth. Still very handsome though.
ChrisVery handsome. I've never noticed this. It's hilarious. Yeah. Now I'm just gonna picture him with one huge tooth in the middle of his mouth.
ColinLook up the meme. It's very findable.
ChrisThat's hilarious. I didn't notice that. I noticed how cool he looked. So I someday, I was always like, I'll be a bartender backup if this English degree doesn't work out. So yeah, that, that's how I wandered into that. And then it being close, you know, when you're living with your parents after college, having a place that's close is, you know, I didn't have a car or anything. So yeah that all culminated in that decision and it was still tenuous in the beginning too. Like I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't know what, where anything would go. It was mostly just that I could do landscaping or work at a fast food joint or whatever. You know, I think everyone has that kinda moment after school in general.
ColinI think when you're in your late teens, early twenties, you see, you know, career restaurant servers and you've, and you know, you're like, oh, I'll go get a busboy job, or I'll go work at this pizzeria, and you're like, oh wait, you're making like, you know, a grand to a couple grand a month here. That's crazy. So definitely the appeal of the fast money when you're young and if you just know someone who works at the spot. That's how I got my first job. I knew someone who worked there. Oh, cool. Okay. So it was like, you know, I worked at, you know, like pizzerias and stuff, but it wasn't anything legitimate. I wouldn't call it like actually working, but you know, 'cause it was like, you know, maybe eight hours a week when I wasn't doing sports or Boy Scouts or like other extracurriculars. Yeah, sure. Yeah. Interesting. So this Irish pub, did they, what was the Irish beer flight? Because I'm very critical of this being from a very Irish area of the US right. So for me, this is a good question, but the wrong
Chrisquestion. I might have misspoke. I don't even know if it was fully an Irish pub. I just know that was like the, a very local, they could have been German, honestly, but like it was just a, you know, did they serve Guinness? Didn't have a flight. Didn't have Guinness on tap. Oh, so not an Irish pub. I think it's a wall. Yeah, that's fair. It was probably a German pub. 'cause the owner, he insisted that I drink Yeager with him. That was my first shot ever. And he would literally do 13 shots a night. Mallor big out
Colinthere too?
ChrisOr
Colinis
Christhat
Colinjust Chicago? Yeah, I think it was
ChrisChicago. Yeah. I definitely heard more about Mallor than drank it, but yeah, Yeager was big. I like just down those with him and you know, those like first owners you meet where they're like, Hey, I'm gonna like you if you're gonna fuck around with me a little bit. Yes. And he was that guy who's I've been here too long. My daughter's the bartender. Here's some new blood, let's make him drink all the shots. So
Colinyeah the Jager was kept as cold as humanly as possible. Okay. Yeah we had a Yeager chiller with a, with
Christhe three bottles. Yeah, it was, he was a serious Jager drinker. Oh, that's amazing. That's amazing. German's great beer too. Yeah. Yeah. I grew up with a lot of German people. German like town. A lot of influence in Wisconsin there. German Polish. But you said you got, you knew the guy at your first job. How'd you get that?
ColinSo he's actually my niece's dad, he was working there. Oh, sure. So he had worked there as a line cook and then he recently switched over to front of house. He knew I was looking for a job. I was in community college and he was just like, Hey, you know, they need bus boys. Yeah. And I was like, perfect. I need a job. So it kind of just worked out and then kind of just grew from there. He actually got let go from the job two weeks after I first started there. And I was like, oh, interesting. Yeah. Okay. That changes the dynamic. That's always, yeah. That's weird. So sometimes it's not good to have a reference from someone who works somewhere. Yeah. Yeah.
ChrisEspecially if they're about to get fired. Yeah. Yeah.
ColinSeriously. But I didn't know that at the time, but it is what it is. He's a good guy. He's a hard worker, but totally it is just you know,
Chriswouldn't that make him, your brother-in-law?
ColinNo, not technically, not by law. Oh, okay. Him and my sister aren't married, so. Oh, okay. Yeah
ChrisYeah.
ColinBut we were close with their family.
ChrisSuper chill.
ColinYeah.
ChrisSo how long did it take you to be a bus boy to bartending? What was the trajectory there?
ColinAbout 10 months because the firing of employees really worked out in my favor, not in the sense that I orchestrated anything, but, you know, they caught a bunch of servers hitting a weed pen in the coat room. Oh, easy. So four servers got fired. I was a busboy. I cared about, you know, learning about wine and like wanting to be better at, you know, being a server and doing my job. And then that kind of elevated me up to the serving position. Then IPOed for a little while. And then another set of bartenders got fired for some hijinks behind the bar, including letting guests pour their own beers on the tap. Oh, there you go. Yeah it was a whole thing. And then also while a secret shopper was in, are you familiar with that too? Yeah, of course. Secret shopper, of course. Yeah. Yeah. So that got on the secret shop at report. So that was just a, oh shit. Yeah, a general you know, not good. It a very, that's a Tom Pooley right
Christhere.
Lots of, lots
Colinof Tom foolery. So then I became like a 19-year-old bartender, 18-year-old bartender. And my it was like right around my birthday and the GM was just like, Hey, listen. If anyone asked how old you are, a lion, say you're 22. Yeah, I, dude, so I was 22 for three, four years, you know, it was crazy. And like some of my regulars caught on and they were like, how old are you really? I'm like, I can't tell you. I'm not allowed to drink
Christhe thing I'm serving. Yeah.
ColinThat's the funny thing. So in New Jersey, the way the liquor laws are set up you can. Serve alcohol at 18. You just can't drink any of it. So if they did any wine tasting, you couldn't drink any of the wine tasting. You couldn't even do like the spit cup. Oh, sure. Yeah. So it was just a lot of memorization facts and stuff like that. So it'd be interested, be like, oh, what do you like to drink? And I'd be like not that I do drink, but Yeah. You know, so it's always funny.
ChrisMy favorite's. Milwaukee's best. Yeah. Have you tried this deluxe beer? Lemme tell,
Colinlemme tell you. Natural light. Yeah,
Chrisnatural. The most natural, crisp
Colinfinish. Good acidity.
ChrisOh man. Dude, the Midwest is fucking crazy. 'cause there's so many jobs that are like that, like under the table kind of shit. You're not open enough to do this course. And it's so much harder to be a good bartender. And probably, you know, a good server as well. But anyone who serves a product they can't interact with is you know when I started bartending, I really had the notion that I was gonna be like a really healthy bartender and not drink. And I didn't, for the first few years after the guy, I was like, I gotta clean my shit up. And I got moved to Madison, did the whole thing. But I was insistent on not drinking the shots of Jamo and the PBRs at the end of the night. But I certainly got better at describing liquor and beer and all that when I started interacting and enjoying it a little more.
ColinYeah. I mean, tasting notes say the same, 35 buzzwords, you know? Yeah, sure. And I've always found that, you know, palate especially is so subjective that, you know, if you know, want to be able to sell something, you simply have to try it. And, you know, that doesn't mean that, you know, you need to go out and pound Fett all night long and, you know,
Chrisdon't tell me what to do. I thought you were cool. Yeah, you don't have to. You can, I'll never pound F for the record. Oh my God, no.
ColinGood lord. That's another cliche bartender thing to Fett. Yeah, of course. But you know, product knowledge is really important. Tasting is really important. Tasting with purpose, you know, not just tasting with purpose. I like that. Yeah. Yeah. Not just, you know. I'm just, oh, they put a cocktail up on service bar, so I'm gonna take a straw full. 'cause you know, I had a little, couple beers on my break and I'm trying to keep the buzz going, keep the buzz going, you know what I mean? But yeah, that's another thing. The lifestyle can be crazy sometimes.
ChrisI mean, you're telling me that's why I made this podcast. I have a, I have too much lifestyle and not enough episodes out. So we gotta, yeah.
ColinSee that's the nice thing about being new in town is I don't really know too many other bartenders yet. So if I like go out to eat, it's not necessarily an issue of overserving. Yeah, sure. Like the town that I worked in the whole time. So there's, you know, 13, 14 bars in the small town in New Jersey and, you know, you get to know all the bartenders, especially once you start working at different routes or restaurants, everybody kind of bounces around. Totally. So, you know, it's just one of those things where it's like you're gonna go out in town with your friends and you'll be like, how do you know this bartender? How do you know this bartender? It's oh, I worked with them. Oh, I didn't work with them, but they used to take breaks at a restaurant that I worked at all the time. It's just, you know, it's just the, a fun little community, but it can get out of hand. Quickly sometimes.
ChrisAbsolutely. No it's in general, it's hard when you want to be friends with the people you work with, but then some of them are like, Hey, I'm gonna do blow all night. You wanna join that? Or some people are just like, Hey, I like to do a lot of shots, or just stay up really late. You know, it's like you can pick your poison, but there's gonna be some aspect of it's gonna be unhealthy. Yeah. It's very hard to stay the straight and narrow being health conscious while working in an industry that encourages even so much debauchery.
ColinYeah. I mean, I feel like bartenders, just from seeing so many people get overserved in so many situations, like if I'm out with some of my industry friends and I'm like, they're like, oh, let's do another round of shots. I'm like, nah, I'm just gonna have a clip soda. I'm just gonna mix in a clip soda. They're never gonna. At least my friends, at least from back home, never would be like, Hey you know, you're soft or Yeah. Anything like that. They're just like, oh, okay. Yeah. Sober up. Mix one in, you know, get some chicken fingers while you're at it.
ChrisYou don't, I mean, at some point you have been the guy who has had too much and said, yes, course. Of course. Let's do the more shots. And then you're the guy puking later that no one wants to be around. So you learn from that pretty fast.
ColinYeah. The, when the Eagles played the Patriots in the Super Bowl the first time in 2017 something. Yeah, something like that. I went to this little small dive bar in Morristown, New Jersey called Taro. And I love that bar. It's my favorite bar in the world. And when. I went there, I got so absolutely obliterated that I just left in the third quarter of the game. I had no invested just to, yeah. I just I was like, I gotta leave. Yeah. And then I went the next day and I was like, did I close out? I don't remember closing out. Do you guys have my card? I have the charge. I was like, so embarrassed. And they were like, not you're good. Took good care of us too. Alright, as long as you're that kind of drink. Yeah. You need a pint. I'm like, no, I'm good man. Got you dad. Catch you later. It's always good to have good friends with you in the industry who aren't necessarily just shoving tequila down your mouth all night and just letting you mix one in every once in a while.
ChrisTotally. Yeah, I had plenty of those days and I feel like I'm still learning lessons that I knew already, you know what I mean? Even in the past like two years, I've thrown up like maybe six times from drinking. I'm like, what is that? I was so good for a long time, and then it's just like some nights get outta hand or I haven't eaten enough, and you do three shots of repo with your bartending pals and like suddenly it's, you know, yeah, you're off to the races.
ColinRed wine gets me like that. Yeah, I went to dinner. I'll have a polish off like a good amount of red wine and I'm just like, I stand up like, oh, I made a mistake. Like you don't feel it when you're sitting down. It's so true.
ChrisYeah. Yeah. Especially when the vibe's still going, then everyone stops talking, gets through Uber and you stand up. Yeah. That's rough.
ColinIt's one of my favorite things. When you watch a bar guest stand up and they wobble a little bit. I call it sea legs. And sea legs. You watch 'em kind of back and forth. Especially if I've wor I've worked in a lot of like really long restaurants. Yeah. So you can really watch someone move about the space
Chrisand it's lovely. It's like the pre drinking test that a cop would do. Can you walk down the aisle between the booths and the chairs? Can not bump anyone.
ColinCan you wade your way through this three foot wide strip?
ChrisYeah. I know it's three feet. It's pretty narrow, but, oh man. I think that was a really good thing that happened early on in my bartending career was I drank first. I was at that tavern doing the egger shots, moved to Madison, didn't really try weed until I was right about to move to Madison. But once I discovered weed, I was like, oh, you can still have a great time and not feel so shitty about
Colinthis. Yeah. I
Chrismean, not the same thing, but Yeah.
ColinYeah. I just feel like the loss of motor control and the lowering of inhibitions while drinking alcohol are definitely a downside.
Yeah. Yeah.
ColinBut I also, there's like pocket that you can sit in, right? So if you're day drinking and you're like, alright, I know it's gonna be a long day, it's gonna be seven, eight hours. I need to, you know, you're hitting bars before a baseball game or tailgating, like whatever it may be. Just like hitting that little buzz and then just slowly tapering off. Yeah. Have Aperol spritzes all day. You don't need all the A v. Yeah. You're gonna get there. It's just a matter of time. You know what I mean? Totally. You know, just drink light beer. You don't have to go crazy. Yeah. You know? So I think it's a balancing act for
Chrissure. I've never been good at day drinking. I think that's the reason why is 'cause I, when I drink, I like to start and then keep going and then have it be like a focused four hours where I'm getting to the level I wanna be. If I have to work at measuring myself, it's harder to like, just let loose, you know? Yeah.
ColinI like day drinking as a secondary function though. Like it's not
Chrisan accessory to an event.
ColinYeah, it's not, we're going bar hopping all day. Right. It's, you know, we're tailgating. There's also a bunch of food. If anything, there's more of an emphasis on food, right? Yeah. Or oh, we're going snowboarding. So, you know, we stop and we have a couple drinks while we snowboard. We have a pre after, you know, or it's golfing. You have a couple beers, you know, so it's really not, I feel like, honestly,
Christhat'd be my favorite place to drink is golfing, but I've like never done it. I've only had like spra root beer with my dad. We used to do that all the time. That was awesome. But yeah, I haven't had a couple beers and enjoyed like IPA sunny seventies day. Oh yeah. That sounds nice to me. Yeah.
ColinMy last bar I was at, we had. Every Monday off. So it was originally me another bartender and one of our managers, which evolved into being a wide rotating cast of people as golf has gotten more popular. Sure. We had every Monday off, so every Monday we would play golf. Nice. The three of us, that's four. I did it for three straight years. My girlfriend was so mad. Every Monday morning I would wake up 6:30 AM Nice, excited, ready to go. And then we're like anything else? Waking, getting me outta bed in the morning. I'm like, such a dredge, you know? Yeah. That's another, the industry weekend. My, my old weekend was Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. It was fantastic. Oh my God. The best weekend ever. Yeah. Now it's Monday, Tuesday, which is also fantastic I think. I don't mind the weekdays off because I'm. I don't know if it's been beaten out of me from the industry, but I'm just not really a people person on my days off. I don't find myself wanting to go out and do things that are overly social, go to a bar or you know,
Chrisrecord a
Colinpodcast. Just record a podcast. You hate being here. I get it. Exactly. Yeah. Sorry man. I side all my way here. All 45 minutes. Yeah. Good. Just kidding. I fucking puffing. But you know, it's just like on my days off it's I don't mind the, you know, 'cause you go to a museum, people you know, usually bitch and moan that the museums packed. Go on a Monday. No one's there. Yeah. Yeah. It's empty. Yeah. Empty. You can do whatever you want. The roads are empty. Lemme tell you, if you live in a mountainous area and ski traffic is an issue, become a bartender. You can go skiing Monday, Tuesday. You never hit a lick of traffic.
ChrisTrue. That's all very true. And said. But the problem is the industry weekend is different from all the event weekend. Yes. So Thursday, Friday, Saturday are when people go out and do their things. Correct. And then you know, have off Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and all the events already passed. Yeah. And it's hard to take off work if you're, you know, single or even if you're not just moneywise, you know?
ColinYeah. It just have to have a, you know, the budgeting for the things you want to do is always interesting. I always found that like when I was working in more like club year or sports bars, like late nights, you know, where your real shift is from 7:00 PM to 2:00 AM You know, you have the days off in the morning to go do things so you kinda, so you can go do things on a Saturday or a Sunday morning. I would do that a lot, but. I don't know. Maybe I'm just not a people person, which is funny being in the service industry.
ChrisNo, I'm, I feel you. It's totally, I'm a, I'm kind of a introverted extrovert where I love being at work because that's my real social time to let it all out. But then as soon as I'm done, I'm like, don't talk to me. I'm like, I'm going home. I'm like, dude, you know, I have my own routines or just like decompressing and stuff. That's the classic.
ColinThey go, what do you drink when you get home? I'm like, what? Yeah. What do you, when you go home, like what cocktail do you make yourself? I'm like a glass of wine. Yeah. A bottled beer. Like I'm glass of wine as little effort into this as I possibly can. Yeah.
ChrisI'm not mixing shit unless I have company for sure. Exactly. I'm like having a fucking, even a margarita. I love Margarita are my favorite and I love mixing 'em, but I wouldn't do that at home for myself. It's a project.
ColinSo if you're hosting, right, so you're having like, you know, three or four people over and you're gonna do cocktail what are you doing and are you doing them to order, are you doing like a batched kind of deal? What's your head space there? Because hosting parties I feel as a bartender, everyone's always oh, make us drinks. Make us drinks. And my joke is, you know, you gotta pay my hourly rate. Yeah. You know, it depends on what state you're in. That's a good or a bad thing. But yeah, I, I've always I've done batch, sometimes I've done to order, sometimes. I was just wondering, you know, what's your like mentality behind that? Like when you're hosting and people want cocktails?
ChrisYeah. Great question. I had the opportunity over Christmas break to go home and my friend Rob did a piano concert at his home. Nice. Where we're from and they had 20, 30 people there and I offered to bartend. So what I did is buy. A bunch of different types of booze. You know, I had the, you know, your tanker ray, I think I had tanker Ray and Hendrix tequilas, your vodkas, all that shit. And I like to buy like enough to mix like classic cocktails, which doesn't take that many ingredients obviously. Right, right. But I did margaritas, I did old fashioned, or not old fashioned, but Manhattans and stuff like that. But a lot of people are pretty simple, so I feel like as long as you have the alcohol variety that people want and you don't make them go to gin if they hate gin. There's a lot you can do with very simple ingredients. To me, I'd love, I love to make things to order, honestly. That's how I work as a bartender in my professional life. And I feel like that's how I would be as a host and want to be as a host, who having people over is just let me make you feel like I made this specifically for you. Now, if we're having 10 to 20 people over and I don't know half of 'em. Yeah, let's put a fucking thein, isch margarita in a fucking container. I'm putting
Colinout wine in mixers. Still
Chrisa sangria or something, you know, figure it out. Buying
Colinthe biggest bottle of the most probably Kettle One. Honestly. Like Kettle One
Chrishandles the Titos aren't that expensive. Yeah, exactly.
ColinPutting that out. Ginger Ale. Diet Coke if you're a weirdo and some soda. Cut up some fruit and call it at night. Yeah. Oh, you'd cut fruit. That's even more effort than I might, too. I'll cut up some fruit. Damn. All right. Yeah, we used to work me and some of my boys from when I worked in the steakhouse back in the day we worked a private event every year on Christmas Eve, 4th of July for this very wealthy guy in Jersey. Oh yeah. And, he lived in, you know, a really nice part of Northern New Jersey, and he had a shore house and a really nice shore house with a pool on a jetty. Oh, sure. Which is crazy if you think about it. Yeah. You have the ocean's two blocks away. You have a fucking inground pool and jetty access. That's three kinds of water, like within a mile. That's wild. Oh, so nice. But anyway, really cool guy. Really cool guy. But we would work these like private events for Christmas Eve at his house and he would have you know, anywhere from 20 to 55 people in the house at any given time, and it's, you know, three of us. And it would just be, it's so funny dealing with a house guest as opposed to a bar guest. Yeah. Because they're No expand on that. You're like, Hey, what can I, Hey, what can I get for you? And they just want some weird Dr like a mojito. Right. And then the mojitos are weird, but it's just you know, if you see a bartender at someone's house, you're like, I lemme see what I can get. So order Hinney, you're like, ah, I can't make that. Sorry. And it, you know, it kind of, they wanna be like. In the restaurant sense what do you mean you can't make that? Like you're in a re you're in a bar. Yeah. Yeah. But then you're in someone's home. So it's just funny to watch, like the cog kind of clap out for a second, but we had a guy who, he was a guest of this party and he only drank long Island Iced Tea. Sure. So he, the host had this really nice, like bunch of high-end scotches. Crazy tequilas. This guy had Glen Fitch 25. Oh damn. Yeah. You just don't see stuff like that. Right. So, no. You know, VKO Rose for guest champagne if they walk in like crazy party. Yeah. And he like shows me like Dicker triples sec. He's do you think this is good? And I'm like, no. I'm like, it's not supposed to be.
ChrisThis convinces me that people with money barely or rarely know if something's actually good. They're just like, they know what they like, they know what they like when they have it, but like not knowing if the Cooper's a bad triple set. I mean that's just, yeah. I mean you'll find that in defunct bars. Not even operational bars. I don't even know if that brand's still around. Oh yeah. My last bar. Very successful college bar. Yeah. Lots for sure. The college keeping them around. Yeah, exactly. No, Quatro, keep SNPs. Let's go. I think we had
Colinone bottle of Quantro on the back bar. Yeah. That we'd never touched. That's your fancy stuff. Yeah. Yeah. It'd be like, what can you make me and be like, ugh Quantro and a mule. Here you go. Yeah, totally enjoy. Yeah. And that's always, I think I think they like what they like and I think there's a discernible taste difference, especially in spirits. The higher up the price point ladder you go, right? So you might not taste the difference between a Macallan eight and a Macallan 12, but you'll taste the difference between a Macallan 15 and a Macallan 12. You'll really taste the difference in a Macallan 25, in a Macallan 15. Yeah, a hundred
Chrispercent. You
Colinknow what I mean? Like cognac is the same way. Like you can get the highest possible label of Hennessy. Right. And that will not stand up to what's the crazy cognac? Oh, Louie. Oh, okay. Louie the 13th, right? Yeah, totally. That's the creme of the creme, the best stuff. That's what people want. So it's just, I think when you have the wealth and you have the ability to purchase and try some of the higher end items, you just simply don't want the lower end stuff anymore. 'cause you're like, why would I drink that if I can afford this? Which is so much better, which I. A hundred percent understand. Totally. You know what I mean?
ChrisAbsolutely. And then once you find your thing, if you have the money, you kind of stop thinking about it. Oh yeah, of course. You know, like you've seen the guest we have at the bar, but this guy is obviously wealthy and orders the same thing every time. But he gets this bottle of Papillon, which is $132, I think, at the bar. And they often, him and his date leave most of the bottle or offer to me like, oh, there's some leptin here, and it's like a fourth full. I'm like, Jesus, dude, this is you know, $25 worth of wine. You just gave me your, you know, so it's
Colinand the wine list isn't even that crazy. No. You think about some of these guys, some of these you know, downtown, any city you're at steakhouses, like you can have bottles on there. Especially if it's like fourth quarter they're taking business people out and they want to show 'em a good time. You know, like you'll have these guys who will order. A second $600 bottle, drink half of it and just leave it on the table. And often it's, they don't care. Yeah, they don't care. I mean, they're writing it off, so why? Yeah, that's what I was gonna say. Yeah.
ChrisThey're normally, it's like a business expense. Yeah,
Colinfor sure, buddy. That's the nice thing about serving at a steakhouse too, is if you can get two tables to get in a pissing contest over wine bottles. Oh,
Christhen you won. Yeah.
ColinAll you gotta do is sell that first bottle of champagne and make a big fucking deal outta bringing out the ice bucket. Yeah. You gotta rattle it, you gotta you know, set it down. Kind of, kind of not near their table around like your other tables. You kind of gotta make a show out of it. Yeah. You know, it's like tableside truffle shaving or you know, poppy steak in Miami does that stupid shit with the fucking briefcase, like that's over the top. Oh, I haven't heard of that. What's this? Oh, so it's this steakhouse in Miami that has a, I think it's like a fucking gold F flaked, 64 ounce bullshit tomahawk or something like that. It's probably a good stick. They probably do a really good job of cooking it. But you're gonna pay, I think it's a thou, it was a thousand dollars, probably more now. I don't even know Jesus. But they basically bringing it. Out tableside with a band of 30 waiters who I think their only job is to celebrate this steak. But this is Miami. This is Miami. This is the culture of the restaurants in Miami. Right. Like you're gonna get that 20% non-negotiable service fee no matter what. Sure. If you ask for a cup of ice, it's on there. Yeah. Yeah. I digress. But they wheel this thing out in this case that has this golden aura light from the top of it. It looks like in pulp Fiction when they pan to the back of Wallace's head and he open and they open up the suitcase. Suitcase and it's just a, it's just the gold beams. Yeah. Shooting out. That's what they do to, that's that stake Yeah. Table. There was a stake in that briefcase actually. They fucking, that makes that such a better plot of the movie. Right. It's just all around five wa Yeah. It's a really good steak man. I'm sorry. They like brand it. Yeah. And then they cook the steak and that's it. But you're basically just paying for this huge song and dance. It's the show. Yeah. But if you can incorporate some of the show into what you're doing, you know, whether it be like. You know, really wheeling and dealing out a big bottle, doing a couple flare tricks while you're bartending, simply just like cracking a joke with a guest, like a well timed one liner. You know, I think it really you can really create regulars that way and kind of enhance everybody's experience, but then also get people to want to interact and spend more, which is really what it's all about.
ChrisYeah, a hundred percent. I mean, obviously you've seen me do a couple of tricks behind the bar, and that helps keep people interested and entertained. And I think it's, it doesn't have to be like physical flare. It could be whatever, it could be the flare of your personality. It could be how you talk to people, how your persona, you know, what your wine knowledge what you put out there. So it's I think it is important though to demonstrate some sort of proficiency at the
very. Thing that you are
Christrying to sell, because especially rich people, like they have this weird vibe of not wanting to be bothered, but also not wanting to be ignored. So you have to do the right balance of Hey, I'm really approaching you and really trying to get a sense of what you like, but as soon as you tell me I'm not gonna upsell you on bullshit, you don't wanna hear.
ColinI was just talking to a server about that the other day. Yeah. They're like, how do you know the difference of someone who wants to talk to you and doesn't want to talk to you? And I was like, you just try to talk to them. And if they're not reciprocal, just know. Yeah. They wanna be left alone. A lot of people go to a bar to talk to a bartender. A lot more people go to a bar to not talk to anybody For real. Yeah. So, you know, I think you just, if you can read both sides of that and you can be like, Hey listen, you wanna show up? You want to chat with me for 30 seconds about what's going on with my life, even though you don't care, that's fine with me. Yeah. You order the same thing every time. You're gonna ask me to put on the basketball game and that's that. You know, and that's, man, that's perfectly fine. I love those people. If the bar was filled with those kind of people all night, I would be ecstatic
Chrisif they all tip 20% at least. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. I guess that's the end. Some of them coming in, they're like, cut. What's that?
ColinAt the end of the day, that's what it's all about. Right? I mean it's
Chrisnot all of it's about, but I mean people can come in and they can park themselves, read a book at your bar and tip, you know, 15% and be like, you didn't interact with me that hard, so I don't feel like I have to really fucking
Colinbook. Yeah, book at the bar is crazy. How do you read at a bar? I don't even mind you. Go to the fucking coffee shop. Go to a fucking library, go to the park. Touch grass, get outta my bar. I'm sorry. If you're not staring at a television and that's what's, you know, consuming you or you're like watching yourself live, lose thousands if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in the stock market. That's cool. Bury yourself in that. Don't read a fucking book. So pretentious. Oh my God.
ChrisI mean it's interesting what you were saying. We were talking about people who don't like to talk and it's I think that's a definite difference between when like Covid is one thing I, I delineate the life I lived bartending from pre covid to post covid. 'cause I think bartending is an industry and all service industries changed.
ColinDude, I worked at this bar where you had to shake every bar guest's hand. Oh really? So when they sat down, they got rid of it during Covid? Yeah. It was like the fucking gospel to have to shake people's hands. Like the manager would be like, Hey you didn't shake that. Go shake that guy's hand. You didn't shake that guy's hand. How crazy. And yeah, it was like, walk guests to the bathroom and if it was like a bar guest and I'd joke sometimes if they were quote, be like, you want me to hold it for you too? And they'd be like, what? I'd be like, how You don't the bar? No. Yeah. Nothing. Nothing. No. Yeah. Nevermind.
ChrisBut it's almost better because if someone comes in and they're like, I, and the difference between pre-phone and postpone obviously change bars incredibly. 'cause it's like. There, there's a few things, right? Old style bar is a community. You have nothing to do but talk. Then you have TVs and bars. Then it's okay, you can sit there and just watch tv, right? But then you have your phone, and then you can have all the content in the world and whatever you wanna watch. So people will literally walk in, now have their earbuds in on a phone call, and I won't talk to them for 10 minutes, and I put all, I got 'em the water, put menus in front of 'em, whatever. But you gotta know, if people wanna be left alone, leave 'em alone. And sometimes people just come in and they're not in the mood and they'll sit in their phone anyway. Then sometimes you wanna bring them out of that and get them open up more. And that could be the move, or it could be like, Hey, you're having a day. Let me just you know, be the silent to assistant to, to this. Yeah,
Colinyeah, for sure. A hundred percent. Yeah. I think it's just reading your guests at the end of the day, like the same way that you wouldn't, you know, sell somebody a bottle of champagne if they were celebrating a kid's third birthday. You know what I mean? It's just
ChrisIf you're not cool. Sure. Yeah. Were you not drinking champagne on your third birthday? No, I don't think my parents
Colinwere either. There more potheads. Yeah. Good.
ChrisI think I'd want the pothead parents over the champagne drinking child's party.
ColinI mean, listen, champagne, you are your third birthday. That is a sign of some type of economic class, so something Yeah. Yeah. You're probably playing lacrosse and hockey and living a good life.
ChrisYeah. Going skiing every, yeah,
Colinexactly. Exactly.
ChrisOh man. Do you have any just out there stories you wanna share from any of your early jobs or anything comes to mind?
ColinYeah. I mean, I got stories for days. Just
ChrisPick one. Have to have you back.
ColinAll right. This is a good one because this is multifaceted and, you know, dealing with guests and then also teamwork and then dealing with security teams if you work at that kind of a bar, so natural this is. You know, a couple years ago I was working at one of my old establishments. The way it was set up was a sports bar upstairs. Then you would go down a flight of stairs on either side of the bar, front entrance or back entrance. And then there was a more clubier bar downstairs. Right. And you had strobe lights. They had, you had DJs upstairs and downstairs, but the DJs downstairs playing more EDM, you know, more club type, feeling vibe. So we had this large marble center bar, right? So just like a little circle in the middle of the floor. And there were six wells, six bartenders would work. It was a pretty nice, pretty big operation. So our standard clientele there was, you know, 21 to 24. So young kids. Yeah. Who, you know, don't really know better. But anyway, so. It is a Friday night and we're just slinging drinks normal. Nothing's too crazy. And I, you know, look over my right shoulder behind me and I see what looks like a girl trying to get on top of the bar, which is a big no-no. I, you know, you don't want people on top of the bar. I'm sure every bartender who's done any kind of like cleaning a mirror behind the bar has the thought of them falling off the top and imp peeling their neck. Oh my poor, oh my God. Yeah. Yeah. It's like just one of the many scenarios I think about immediately. Yeah. So that's, you know, so I, what appears to be her jumping up on the bar and I'm like, Ugh. So I kind of go to walk over to be like, Hey, listen, get down and before I can get over there, 'cause I'm not particularly motivated, she completely jumps over the bar. She's now behind the bar, which is the one place as a patron, you can't be definitely behind the bar. Right. So the more amazing part too, was she cleared a three basin sink as well. No shit. Yeah. Oh my god. Yeah. Athlete. Real athlete. Pure athlete. So she jumps over the marble top, jumps over the three compartment sink, lands flush on her feet. Meets that end of the boil that's working is me, another one of my female coworkers, and then a male coworker who's around my size. Big dude. So she walks behind the bar and I go, Hey you can't be back here. And she goes, I lost my wallet. Okay.
I go, I
Colingo, okay it's probably not back here. Cool, cool. But I can take a look if you just simply leave the bar. She goes, my wallet has $50,000 in it. No shit. I go, no it doesn't. I go, no, it doesn't. She goes, my wallet. I'm like, you can't be back here. I don't know how to, and this is a loud bar. The music is pumping. So working at that kind of a bar, 'cause it'd be hundreds of patrons downstairs real thick. You can't wade through. You have to carry a flashlight on. The point of the flashlight is to tag the bouncer and then tag the gas to the bouncer, knows who to go up to. Oh,
Chrissweet. I've never worked with that. That's cool. Yeah, it's, oh, especially, oh dude.
ColinWe used to have, we used to have like real juice head guys and they would just beat kids up and it was like terrifying, but kind of awesome. Oh yeah, sure. The current crop of guys is much more levelheaded. Go to deescalating. Oh yeah. Which is better for the brand, but not entertaining. Yeah. You know? Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So. I'm like, I like grabbed the girl by her arm very lightly to kind of escort her Sure. Out from the bar. And she immediately just goes wet noodle, limp, like just flubbers down to the ground. And I'm like, motherfucker. So I get her under one arm. My, the other male bartender gets her under the other arm and we literally lift her up like three feet above the air. And I have a pocket knife in my one pocket and the flashlight right next to it. So. I'm trying not to grab my pocket knife and stab this girl by accident. I'm trying to get my flashlight, finally get the flashlight out while she's like kicking and flailing about, I go to flash the bouncers. The bouncers look at me and go, what the fuck? Because usually it's Hey you know, come over here. You kind of wave 'em over. You're like, it's not that big of a deal. Yeah. Come on over. Some frat boy doesn't wanna pay his tab. Right. It's the easiest thing. But he sees me and the other bartender holding this girl in air. So we set her down lately as the bouncers kind of make their way over and she tries to ju us out behind the bar. Like she isn't going to like It's not a contained environment. Yeah. I don't know. It was crazy. So she tries to ju us out. We grab her again, we give her to the bouncer, she gets escorted out. It was like this whole scenario, but. The comradery that was experienced with me, my coworker and the surrounding bar guest was amazing because I had kids hitting the Heisman pose at me. Yeah. That's being like, you're an athlete. And I was like, no, I'm not. If I was an athlete I wouldn't be doing this. Yeah. But yeah it was very interesting. And then yeah, followed up with that. She got trespassed so she's not allowed back. Okay. And yeah, it was just hysterical to actually watch someone jump over the bar and then be like, Hey, I had $50,000 in my wallet.
ChrisHow old is she? I dunno. 21. Yeah. She must been like bear bonds. Totally. I
Colindon't know how the fuck that works.
ChrisQuestion. Did they find the 50,000? I have no clue. Yeah, I don't know. I plead the fifth. I dunno.
ColinI did we find if, listen, if they found it, I didn't get a fucking piece. That sucks. So if the one thing that's keeping you from getting a piece is some type of you know, confidentiality agreement, I'll sign, let me know. Yeah. You know what I
Chrismean? Yeah, for sure. A second funny part of that story was, do you have a fixed blade knife just sitting in your pocket? No. How would she accidentally stabbed? No. So it was like, I don wanna stab this chick. I don't know what I'm gonna
Colindo. Get the f or fucking Yeah. I got a fucking, I got six K bars in my boot. No, it's a spider coone knife. So it has a very ergonomic opening. So I was afraid that if I Oh, so you could slip it out and kind of Yeah. I was afraid if I slipped it out, my thumb would catch you at the right angle and I would stab this girl. Totally. So I'm very happy that I didn't, yeah. That could have been a different end of this. Yeah. I did give a girl on her 21st birthday a pineapple upside down shot. And she was allergic to pineapple.
Oh,
Colingood. So, yeah. So it absolutely ruined her night, most likely. 'cause she was like, my mouth is numb. And I went, I'm sorry. Wait
ChrisWait. Did you see she say, I'm allergic to pineapple. And you're like, you'll love this. No. She
Colinsaid, I'm 21. Make me a shot. So I said, okay. Yeah. No specifications, nothing. She was just like, I think I was like, usually I'm much more rude than that, especially in the bar that I was working at the time. So I think I was probably just so immeasurably weeded that I was like, fine. If that's what's gonna get you outta my face. Totally. If I could just make you a shot. Sure. So vanilla stole, easy to find pineapple juice. Easy to find a grenadine on the rail. Yeah. You know what I mean? So it's just like here. Totally. Oh, it's so good. What is it? Pineapple upside down. I'm allergic to pineapple. It sucks. Should
Chrisask
ColinPearl
ChrisWhitelaw. Yeah. Don't order a random, I can't believe anybody who would order a random anything, food or beverage from someone they don't know with having an allergy to something. Yeah. If your mouth could go numb if someone just handed you the wrong thing. Like
Colinespecially the current culture in restaurant surrounding allergies. Oh, totally. Yeah. It's got more intense because like my sister has a whey protein allergy, so Oh. It's not necessarily lactose. So if something's lactose free, she can't necessarily have it so very, but a very severe dairy allergy. So like explaining that growing up to like servers about oh, can they have eggs? Eggs aren't dairy technically, but no. Or Yeah, she can have eggs, but no milk product. No cheese, no milk product. No cream, no yogurt, you know, whatever. Totally nothing that comes out of a cow. Yeah. And or a sheep or lamb for that matter. Nothing with, anyway. We get it. But she would, she, you know, it would be difficult for her to order anything, but I feel like nowadays, 90% of the time when I go out to eat, if I'm sitting at a table, especially, it's Do you have any allergies or dietary restrictions?
ChrisOh, you have to. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. At the bar at least. It's nice 'cause regulars you, you learn all their shit pretty fast. But
Colinyeah. And it's like competent adults, usually at most restaurants who like, know what they like and know to just tell you ahead of time. Oh, hey I need this gluten free. Or Hey, I don't want any dairy in this. Or yeah, for sure. Oh, I'm a vegetarian. You know what I mean?
ChrisAbsolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I have this lady that I just call her allergies because she's a dairy, gluten, soy, eggs and what Have you met her too? She's awesome. But they're a very nice couple. I shared the same anecdote with them. I was like, I get it. Yeah. The first time I met her I was like, I'm not gonna learn your name. I'm gonna learn your allergies first and go from there. Oh, that's so true. I'm so bad with names. I haven't met anybody's name yet. I've been there for
Colintwo months. I don't Oh, really? Know anybody's name. Nobody I know what they drink, which is arguably more important. It is arguably more, and I say that every time.
ChrisYeah. Yeah. I mean, the important thing is that you make them feel remembered, even if they're not, you know? Yeah. No I remember
Colinthem. I'm just terrible at
Chrislearning names.
ColinYeah. Like even the staff, like even when I'm new to a restaurant, like learning all of the servers names takes me like two, three weeks. I
Chrismean, the turnover can be two or three weeks long, sometimes the servers. So it's yeah. Yeah. You never know. And bartender for that matter. Yeah.
ColinDepends on the spot. Yeah. Yeah,
Chrisfor sure.
ColinYou have any good, you have any good industry stories? Any wacky bits? Oh, I got, I
Chrisgot plenty. I don't know. I don't know. I I didn't think of one for this app or anything. I mean, you were talking about like steakhouse vibes. My favorite, one of my favorite jobs was steakhouse I worked at in Wisconsin. And the Midwest is the perfect place to have a steakhouse, like outside of Germany or like you dark. Polish Germans, like the beer culture, everything like, not like beer goes to steak, but you know, it's heavy, heavier foods, heavier vibe. So I worked to this place and I was still in that vein of trying not to be too debauch with my lifestyle. And that kind of twisted there because we would have, I would go in around, I think four 30 and our dinner menu ended at one, and then we switched over to a late night menu. No, wait, I'm sorry. Was that dinner menu ended at 11? So 11 to two we had the late night menu, which is, you know, smaller, fair and easier to make. But shit was fucking shit gets real at 11:00 PM if people are allowed to come in and like they know they're not going anywhere until the early hours of the morning, which it obviously was like it. Shit, I think I, I had never experienced that kind of vibe where it wasn't like a structured shift. It was like, oh, you're gonna leave when people leave. And you can call, ask, call, but you know, if the people know the owner, you're definitely staying there until three or four. Like you can, there's so many situations where it was just a an eyeopening of you know, the opportunity of both people who work there and the guests to kind of get a little more wild. Yeah. Which I liked
Colinthe best is, at those late night spots when it gets real, real late, it's just, especially if you're like a bartender who has a set of keys oh fuck yeah, I did. Pull up a chair next to the bar guest, sit down next to them. It's such a wild ride. Just pull out that bar stool, plop a spot, and be like, if you need anything, lemme know. Man, dude. And they're just like, they'll look at you and you just have to have that stern confidence about you. And then just go back to just staring in the tv. Yeah. Yeah. It's the funniest move. And then eventually you know, if you especially have, if they're regulars and you have like really good rapport with them they'll be like, are you gonna sit on the other side of the bar yet? And you'll be like, ah, I'm still cleaning. Yeah,
Chrisyeah. That's what I got a little thing. Yeah, no, that's totally true. And like the, it wasn't even that I had to sit at the other side of the bar. It was like I was doing, I was making shots when I wanted for whomever I wanted. Without anybody's say so. Yeah. So is that kind of job where like they, as soon as they trust you and you're doing a good job, they're like, oh, you got some fucking leeway to fuck around a little bit. Yeah.
ColinYeah. Once you have the clout, it's definitely yeah, it's definitely a lot easier to get away with things, but that the long leash is sometimes a noose. If you yeah, if you don't you know, mind your ps and Qs about what you're doing when you're fucking
Chrisin your twenties, you're not minding shit. You don't like, oh my God, no. You don't care. No, I'm like, I was doing, I was definitely doing seven, eight shots a night. Me and the kitchen staff, I literally have my two friends in the kitchen on the line. So you ate
Colingood two if you were hooking up the kitchen staff? Oh, dude,
ChrisI fucking, okay. I would bring weed to work, hook up the kitchen staff. They would hit me up. They would have a dab rig that we would go out back in the alley Perfect. And just burn and actually with a torch and do that shit. So that was, that's as like hardcore as you can look in a Wisconsin alley in a really nice little town in the Midwest. Heroin didn't make
Colinit out there
Chrisyet. We had heroin. It just wasn't in the back alley. It wasn't like back alley, it was just like, you know, like cute little Midwestern kids. Oh. This is like a nice little downtown. I mean, this is downtown Madison the most downtown. Okay. You can get, so you're right on the Capitol Square. Gotcha. It was right behind the police station, so our alley face. So you were safe where the cops would come in, you were very safe. They would drive by and we would look over as we're hitting it and they would never bother us. So that was fucking cool. Probably had better thing to sit down. Yeah, right. Hopefully. But yeah, so we would do that. Then the kitchen guys would hook me up with food. I mean, even our shift meals were fucking sick.
ColinYeah. Oh, family meal. Good family meal. Great Family meals. Bad family meal is so bad. Oh, we'd like, when I used to work at the steakhouse, we would be like, you know, it was a very profitable restaurant, but about 35, 40% of the profits would come in December and January. Yeah, for sure. That's the busiest time of year, right? Yeah. So, you know, it would be so funny 'cause it would be after Thanksgiving weekend and we would, the whole staff would look at each other and be like, it's gonna be chicken bone in chicken legs and rice for 60 days. Yeah, let's go 60 days. 60 nights we're out here. Totally. Yeah, the raw chicken and rice, oh
Chrismy God. You get those staples seasonally. And obviously the Midwest is covered in snow for nine months of the year, so it was lot of heavier foods.
ColinYeah. Oh fuck. Eat a big family meal and then you get back behind the bar and you're like, oh, I'm gonna take a nap. Especially if it's a dark bar. Oh,
ChrisYou said you had a bad family meals. What was your worst one?
ColinI, you know, so this was at this like farm to table restaurant? It was actually attached to the steakhouse. They shared a wall. Oh, cool. And a liquor license, but not a kitchen. It was two, two separate kitchens. Nice. Actually there was like a, if you went through the one walk-in, you could go into the back of the other restaurant. Yeah. So it was like a secret corridor. It was pretty cool. Oh yeah. That's what I used to do to go steal temp butter when I would expo for, oh, for butter. Ramekins from the pastry chef. Sorry, admit years later. She knows. But yeah, it was just it would be do combined family meal. So it was a brunch spot. So on the weekends the steakhouse would do the family meal, and then on the weekdays, the other restaurant would do the family meal. The one that I worked at the time. Oh, cool. They did a fucking hummus bar. Ugh. A hummus bar. I was like, are you kidding me? I'm working a fucking bubble and you're gonna put up a hummus bar like you're asking me to go get hammered on my break. Yeah. Like you need to understand what you're doing to the staff. Right, right. So Hummus Bar was definitely a loss, but on the 10 year an or the 15 year anniversary of the steakhouse, they gave us flank steak and lobster. So that was, yeah, that was really cool. And potatoes groten. That was sick. That was the stick family meal. I had the day off and they were like, because usually it's like family meals for the people who are working in the lunch or the dinner shift or the double or whatever. Yeah, for sure. They were like, I don't care if it's your day off, come in. They're like, we want, so the whole, like the whole back of house staff, the whole front of house staff, like everybody was there. It was awesome. It was a sick family meal.
ChrisMan, I had I had venison on my steakhouse. Nice. That was, I don't, and I didn't even eat meat often back then. Right. But when I would go out, they would give you like 50% off your bill if you ate in or whatever. And fucking dude, we would load up and that venison was sick.
ColinYeah. That's the other nice thing about if they do like food tastings for the staff, you can get some cool shit. I worked at this awesome spot in Jersey that was this cozy little, like 13 seat bar, 50 seat restaurant. Like fireplace, like real low lighting, candle lit. God, I miss candles and fireplaces, dude. Yeah. Now it's all industrial bullshit. That's the problem. Yeah. Or LED candles. Yeah. Or LED candles. Yeah. But they used to do they rotate the menu like every day. Pretty much. You'd be, oh, fresh print menu. They would rotate stuff all the time. Like fresh
Chrisprint, daily menu.
ColinFresh print, daily menu. Dude, that is hard. Yeah. I mean, you, I mean, so a lot of the dishes are the same. Stu stuff rotates. It's. Variations on theme things come back, you know? So it's if you're, it takes you a little while to get used to the menu, but then once you see things like, listen, chefs are just like bartenders when they're making cocktails, like they're going to use the same seven, eight ingredients. Yeah. For sure. You know what I mean? They're just gonna kind of do the little riff on 'em. So once you learn the riffs, it is what it is, right? Yeah, definitely. So, but we were trying like fucking bone marrow, like Japanese oysters, like he was getting crazy shit. Yeah. And this place used to be an Irish pub that they made into a upscale American cuisine spot. Okay. Sick. So it was like, the concept was really weird. But he's one of the best chefs I ever worked for. He owns a spot in Jersey called Black Sheep Provisions in Garwood. Highly recommend they shot up. Get the pig. Hell yeah. Get the fucking pig. Get five of your friends and get the fucking pig. You heard it your first Fuck yeah, man. Yeah.
ChrisOh fuck, dude. They used to spoil me when I, when we had a, when you'd work, you have a staff meal or a, not a staff, you'd just have your ship meal. And I would get. It'd had the best brussel sprouts I've ever had at this place. Buttered, charred perfectly. And then they make me like root veggies. Yeah, I was trying to be vegetarian back then too. And yeah, potatoes and shit. Fucking, are there any better potatoes than at a steakhouse? No good roasted veggies, good potato, like god damn
Colinpotatoes and whipped potatoes sweet potato casserole, if you wanna count that, which I do. I love
Chrissweet potatoes, so,
Colinyeah. Yeah, I think I think working at a restaurant where you like the menu is important because that's gonna be a good chunk of a lot of the food that you eat. Yeah. If you're either getting a family meal or you just have a sick discount.
ChrisSo I think,
Colinyeah, definitely steakhouses, definitely solid Italian places. Definitely solid. Amazing. Can go wrong with an Italian place. Sure.
ChrisYeah, just like in the cuisine. 'cause then you get more knowledge about what you enjoy eating and it's so much easier. Like we just switched up our menus a couple weeks ago and I've been, you know, I tried everything that was vegetarian on it already, and immediately I was better at selling it immediately. I knew exactly the flavor notes to point out and cause you definitely get a sense of like the kind of vibe people want if they're just like, oh I'm in the mood for a full meal steak thing. Or I just want a quick slice of pizza or a salad or whatever. And I think it's so much easier and better to kind of steer people than upsell, you know, in general.
ColinYeah. Without a doubt. Yeah. A hundred percent.
ChrisWhat else we got? We're almost at an hour. I kind of wanna hit it. We got six minutes. Is that cool? I get a quick topic. What's your feeling on dating in the industry? Did you meet your lady there or
Colinno? No, I met my lady on a dating app. Nice, okay. But she's a nurse, so I think dating at the restaurant you work at isn't a good idea. I've done it. Yeah. Not a great idea. It hasn't worked out for either. I know. I know a lot of people who have done it and it's been very successful and great for them. Yeah. You know what I mean? But I, you know, I wouldn't recommend but I think it's important to have someone who either has adjacent hours to you or is understanding of your strange hours. Yeah. Because I think, you know, like for example, like my girlfriend being a nurse, she would elect to work weekends a lot of the time, so we could have weekdays off together, which is nice, or Yeah, for sure. You know, if she starts work at 4:00 PM and I don't start working till 4:00 PM we have the morning to hang out, which is good. So I think it's mostly just, you know, trying to find. Someone who works with the hours then also works with the lifestyle that you live. So like I'm not like a crazy go out party all the time, person, you know, I'm definitely more stay home, chill out. That's more my speed. She's the same way. Yeah, for sure. If you're like one of the industry persons where it's like, Hey, listen, like I'm getting outta work at 10 o'clock tonight. I'm going on the fucking dive bar down the street, and then I'm gonna see what I can get into. Yeah. You need to date someone who also has that same mentality, because if you don't, you're, they're just gonna be like, why the fuck are you showing up home drunk every morning at 4:00 AM You know what I mean? Totally. So it's just it's like dating anybody else. You wanna just make sure that you have, you know, confirm, you know, confirm or congruent personalities and not, you know, conflicting ones.
ChrisYeah. And schedules too. I mean that's such a good point with if you're dating someone who's literally on the opposite schedule or works a morning nine to five or whatever, like I've tried dating those people and it never works out. Like even if you like the person a lot, like love is quality time and attention and in some sense, and it's super hard if you're just always. Kinda struggling to find the time to keep getting to know each other or keep growing. You can have good experiences, you know, and they can Oh yeah. You know, but it's not the same at all. So like, when I met my ex at the comedy club we worked at it was immediately like, we just loved hanging out together. We would get off work, go home together, like fucking Game of Thrones burritos awesome. Wake up. She lived down the block. So we fucking she would walk home, then we'd see each other a couple hours later going to our job. So it was like, you know, you get in that rhythm. I think it's almost easier if you like the person to fall in love with that, you know?
ColinYeah.
ChrisBut for sure, dude, I've struggled with that so long now just going to bed too late and like my schedule got fucked from that steakhouse. I was
Colinmove, move to our time zones inland. That's the, yeah. Is that the move? That's the move. You should look at Alaska. Yeah. I'll take a look. 'cause every time I wake up at. 10 30, I'm like, oh, it's noon east coast time. I can get up. You know what I mean? I gotta tell you, like eight o'clock, I was like, ah, it's 10 east coast time. I'm good to go. That'll wear off 'cause it's, you know, been noon. But yeah the sleep schedule is the all time worst for the sleep is the clo in no matter where you work, how early you get out. If you close and then you gotta open the next day, oh, go fuck yourself. You should just sleep in your fucking car. Yeah. For real. You know what I mean? Especially if you're working at like late night spots where you're getting home at four in the morning and you're like, fuck, I gotta go in at 11 to open up the bar. Fall. Like when you have less
Christhan eight hours to leave your job and get back to your job, that iss a break a nightmare. It's a break. Yeah. That's not even an end to your shift. That's literally like passing out for a little bit and rushing back in.
ColinYeah. That's we St Patrick's Day in the town I used to work was a huge deal and they would do they'd shut down the streets for a parade. And I would always work the Friday night shift before St. The St. Patrick's parade day because. I knew that if I had eight hours of sleep going into that shift, none of the rest of the staff would respect me. Yeah. And I needed to show up as dredged out and zombified as they could possibly be. Yeah. You know, I had to match that energy. I had to also grit my teeth and bear through it. And I think that helped out on the busier shifts. I mean, but we would also show up cases of fucking energy drinks. Oh yeah. I made like chicken salad lettuce wraps and put 'em in the fridge. Like we got like Nice, yeah. Charcuterie boards and shit. Like hell yeah. We would go crazy for those long days where you know you're gonna be bartending for 12 hours minimum.
ChrisYou know what I mean? Oh dude. I haven't done a 13 hour in a while, but I used to do 13 hour triple show comedy days. So you'd go in there around maybe noon to two. And then set up for the first show and then the two regular shows would be later in the evening. So people are showing up for a show at 4:00 PM and obviously they're like not as big of a drinking crowd, but fuck man. It's a long day.
ColinYeah. Just being on your feet. If you can rotate breaks, it's always good. Or if it's if you're working like you and another bartender and it's that slow, just be like, yeah, listen, I'm gonna go fucking find somewhere to fuck off for five minutes. Yeah. And then you can go find somewhere to fuck off for five minutes. That's do a little tag team. We used to do that. We used to hide in the DJ booth. That was the go-to. Oh yeah. Slow Sunday shifts. They would do a Sunday signup sheet. So I would always sign up for what I thought would be the busiest Sundays outta the year. Yeah. Then always someone quits gets fired, dog eats their homework, they can't fucking come into work. They're like, can you do us a favor? And you work like a Sunday at a sports bar in the middle of June and you're like, oh my God, I fucking hate myself. Yeah, for sure. So, you know. You can hide in the DJ booth. Eat a little snack. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I mean, the nice thing now is you know, you can just be stoned at work and no one knows. I mean, they know. 'cause if your eyes Oh, super glassy. I mean not that I would do it at a nice restaurant, not that I would
Chrisever do that. But we can expand upon this. Cut that You admitted it, that submission. I'm saying, I'm
Colinsaying you can be you know, I mean, I just told you I was doing dabs at my last time in
ChrisWisconsin, so I'm not Well
ColinIt's like the obvious vape pen in the server's. Apron at work. Yeah. Or like obvious vape pen. Like I used to keep a Juul in my fucking shirt pocket when I would say, and the GM would always yell at me. He goes, you gotta put the LED on the inside. Yeah. Nice. Yeah. I'm like, what? I'm like, what? He's like when you move around like it jiggles and you can see the LED. That's funny. Put the LED on the inside. I'm like, you're not, that's a solid dude. I'm like, you're not gonna vape in me. You're not gonna yell at me for vaping inside, but you're gonna yell at me for having my vape flashing towards the gas. Yes. That's just the hilarity of the service industry. Yeah.
ChrisThat's fucking great. That's honestly my whole perspective on it. Whatever you're doing, make sure it's not noticeable. Just do your fucking job and do it well. Yeah. And don't get in trouble for whatever substance you may have imbibed before, during work. Get in trouble because you're doing a bad job. Right. You know what, that's, it's like consequences should come from your failure to do your work.
ColinI completely agree.
ChrisBut yeah, I would never do that any anymore. Ever.
ColinWell on that note, no, I'm just
Chriskidding. Yeah, dude, it's been a absolute blast having you on. I really appreciate you being the first guys. Thanks me on. Do you have anything you wanna plug or any projects you're working on or any restaurants you wanna plug besides the pig at that one? Any shout outs to friends? This is your moment.
ColinNo, I'm just gonna shout out the homies at Black Sheep. Black Sheep in in Garwood. Good people, good guys. Jersey guys, independently owned and operated. Stop giving your money to corporate chains and, go support a local community outreach program.
ChrisYeah. Fuck yeah man. That's a good way, a good sign off. Alright, everybody I've been Christopher Connors. This has been Colin, and until next time, stay wild my friends.
