Upserve provides a restaurant management platform which allows independent full-service restaurants to run and manage their entire business. Seth Steinman savors summer sours while sunning by the salty sea. When he's not writing an alliteration, you can find him practicing meditation or sipping his favorite libation.
Breweries are everywhere these days and that’s because the industry is booming in a way that others simply aren’t. As the Atlantic has put it, “between 2008 and 2016, the number of brewery establishments expanded by a factor of six, and the number of brewery workers grew by 120 percent,” while other industries have been crushed by massive corporations.
While that’s great news for small beer businesses, that does mean that there is stiff competition out there. If you want to make sure that your brewery shines and stands out above the rest, follow these three tips to run a more profitable brewery.
1. Build Your Business Around the Right POS
Point of sale systems are important for any bar or restaurant, and your brewery POS system is no exception. First, there’s the legacy versus cloud-based system choice. The legacy ones run on their own independent system and don’t rely on the internet, but that’s where their benefits end. The cloud-based ones operate on tablets, run off of the internet, and can be accessed from anywhere. Then there’s the cool factor, too. Do you want to be seen as stuck in the past or is it important for you that your customers have a cutting-edge purchasing experience that matches the innovative beer you serve?
2. Pair Your Beer With Food
There are plenty of considerations to make when deciding whether or not to serve food, but one thing is sure: Having food, in any form, will keep your guests from leaving to get it somewhere else. Whether you bring in food trucks, allow for outside food, or whip it up yourself, one thing you can do to take your culinary offerings one step further is pairing the food you serve with your beer—especially your sour beer offerings because they’re so confusing to many craft beer newbies—so your customers can have the best brewery dining and drinking experience possible. And if you’re looking for the best sour beers, here’s our list of the best!
3. Keep Your Guests Around Longer With Games and Pets
Dogs are the new kids these days. More and more millennials are choosing to have pets instead of kids and, as Time reports, many are opting to become homeowners so their dogs can have a backyard instead of craving extra space for a growing human family. By allowing dogs inside your brewery, not only will dog owners opt for your place over any other brewery that doesn’t allow dogs, they’ll end up staying longer because they don’t have to go home to feed Fido. It’s employing little tricks like these to keep your customers around longer that keeps more money flowing your way.
Games do the same thing, but aren’t exclusive to pet owners. Once a game gets going, people won’t want to stop and they’ll keep drinking as long as the competition keeps flowing. Plus, when one game is over it can quickly become best out of three, then best out of five and before you know it, closing time arrives and no one has left.