Ask HN: Anyone tried starting up a bar? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Anyone tried starting up a bar?

3 pointsdrekipus8 comments

Hey HN. Has anyone tried opening a bar/restaurant? How did it go? Does it balance with working in tech or did you get burnt out?

I've been wanting to run my own business for a while now, seperate to my job, and I've realised that I don't want to be working infront of screens around the clock (for work and business).

I really enjoy talking to people, and I live in an "up and coming" city that is currently building up some high rise apartments, but there's only two bars in the CBD, so I'm prodding at the idea of opening a 3rd bar and filling a potential gap.

How did it go for you? (Bartending stories also welcome)

Personal background: retail but not bartending. Used to frequent bars as a customer quite a lot. Will aim to get some bartending work in the meantime. Currently in software

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I am not sure if you are asking this seriously.

Managing a bar is not about talking to customers.

A bar (besides the initial capital you might need to open it) is a full-time activity, and you will become an employer, which brings its own additional (after hours) needs, even if you have the best (in the sense of availability) accountant in the world, there will be counting hours of employees, paying suppliers, various bureaucracy, etc..

Even when (if) you are not there you need to be reachable in case of need, essentially it is a 12 hours/day minimum, 7 days a week work, it can only be your main (and only) job.

Otherwise you will need 2/3/4 other people as partners and divide the work.

Not a bar owner, but I spent some time working in fancy restaurants with bars and know some bar/restaurant owners.

The fun parts of owning a bar (stuff like researching and inventing fancy cocktails and chatting up customers, etc) are a small part of the job.

The less glamorous parts of the job involve: not having much of a social life because even when the bar isn't busy you still will be, figuring out how to get consistent customers that you want to get (a well-off crowd that wants to peacefully enjoy an expensive cocktail you can make money on not the loud biker gang that wants the cheapest possible beer), finding reliable employees without any substance abuse problems, dealing with employees that give away large amounts of products for better tips or outright steal product, dealing with borderline drunk/harassing customers, making sure none of your customers die, making sure you don't fuck up any one of a thousand health/safety/alcohol regulations and lose your business, doing accounting and making sure you're pricing things correctly to be profitable, etc.

Luckily, you're on the right track. Your first step should probably be working in a bar. It might be smart to try and it do it a little out of your town (even with a longer commute) and tell the bar owner your plan and offer to work for minimum wage if he's willing to mentor you directly.

My in laws own a restaurant, and it's both a ton of work and not exactly the kind of work they were expecting. My father-in-law went through specialty chef training (VPN pizzaiolo, not culinary school or anything like that), but I don't think he's spent much time in the kitchen after their first year. From what I can tell, all of their time is spent on HR, accounting, marketing, and physical plant maintenance.

Sounds like you should be a bartender before jumping into opening your own bar.

I’d suggest you sit down and watch several episodes of Bar Rescue.

I don't know, but I would guess owning a bar is not the same as being a bar tender. Criminality would be a concern for me.

in the CBD?

central business district.

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