Consulting · Bar staff training
Bar staff training, in your own bar
The bar staff training I run takes place in your own venue, with your menu and your tools. We cover technique, service standards, suggestive selling and product knowledge in hands-on sessions, from half a day to five days, with reference material and a team assessment. Anyone who wants to go further continues at Stillroom Academy.
I design and run training for bartenders and bar teams in your own venue, with your menu and your tools. We work on technique, service standards, selling and product knowledge, tailored to your people. And anyone who wants to keep learning can carry on at Stillroom Academy.
How I work
No generic classes. I start from what your team does today and what your menu demands.
Conversation and diagnosis
We talk about your goals and, if needed, I watch a service to see the team's real level and where things go wrong.
Bespoke programme
I put together the modules you need: your own menu, technique, service standards, suggestive selling, product knowledge (spirits, ferments) or tasting.
Hands-on sessions in your bar
We train with your equipment and your recipes, in full or half days that fit around your shifts.
Assessment
I check what's been learned in practice and give you an assessment of the team, with the points worth reinforcing.
Continuity
I leave you the reference material and point anyone who wants to go deeper to the Stillroom Academy courses that suit them best.
From a working bar.
I run all 10 courses at Stillroom Academy at the bar and in the lab at Stillroom, Calle Moreto 9, Madrid, in groups of no more than eight. As co-owner and creative director of Stillroom, I run a menu of 19 cocktails built on ferments, cordials and infusions from our own lab.
What you get
- A training programme tailored to your menu and your team
- Hands-on sessions in your own bar
- Prep sheets and reference material for day-to-day use
- Written service standards, easy to teach to new starters
- A suggestive selling module so the team recommends the menu naturally
- A team assessment with points to improve
- Optional: Timlup set-up so opening, closing and cleaning get done properly, with checklists signed off by PIN
- Duration
- Indicative: from half a day to 5 days, depending on the programme
- Format
- In person at your venue in Madrid; outside Madrid, just ask
- Price
- Bespoke — ask for a proposal
For the day-to-day running of the bar, I set up Timlup, the management software I distribute.
Is it right for your project?
Bars opening or relaunching
You need the whole team making the menu the same way from the very first service.
Venues with high staff turnover
New people arrive every few months and everyone works their own way. You need standards that can be taught and repeated.
Hotels and restaurants
Your team serves cocktails too, and you want them to do it with sound judgement, without relying on one person.
Brands and distributors
You want to train your ambassadors in cocktail technique and service.
Before we start
Does the training take place at my venue?
Yes. I train in your bar, with your equipment and your recipes, because that's where your team is going to work. That way, what they learn applies from the very next service.
How long does it take?
As a guide, from half a day to five days. A menu refresher fits into a morning; a full programme of technique, standards and selling needs several sessions. I'll confirm it in the proposal.
What do I need to prepare?
Your menu with the current recipes, your usual stock and the bar set up as if for service. If you want to work on selling, it helps to know what sells most and what barely moves.
Can I train just the new starters?
Yes. I can put together induction training for new joiners and leave you the written material, so the team can use it with future starters.
How is this different from Stillroom Academy?
Stillroom Academy runs single-subject courses in small groups, at Stillroom and open to anyone. This training is private and bespoke: your team, your menu and your bar. The two complement each other: anyone who wants to go deeper into a technique can carry on at the Academy.
What if I need one bartender to grow?
That's what bartender mentoring is for: one-to-one sessions over several months on technique, menu creation and career. Team training works with the whole group at once.
Pairs well with: cocktail menu design, cordials and ferments and bartender mentoring.
Related guides
From Bartender to Head Bartender: Duties and Steps
What a head bartender does, how the role differs from a great bartender and how to make the jump: leadership, ordering, costs, team. A guide from the bar.
Cocktail Spec Sheets: Make Every Drink Taste the Same
How to write cocktail spec sheets that standardise your bar: the fields to include, how to train your team with them and how to keep them up to date.
Shall we train your team?
Tell me how many of you there are, what menu you have and what you want to improve. I'll suggest a bespoke programme.
Ask for a proposal