How many extra drinks does a pub need to sell to cover a £250 band?

[TimR]

1 hour ago, 41Hz said:

Could the landlord be referring to the profit per pint after all the fixed costs, wages, rent etc. in the context I’m interested in we can ignore the fixed costs.

 

I've no idea. Happy Jack and Steve both point out that there are different models. I was only quoting what I'd been told. And as I say, I don't see how you can work out individual 'profit' on an individual pint. 

 

You know the cost and you know what it sells for, but that's all you know. 

 

I guess if the difference is £2.50, you need to sell an additional 100 pints above what you'd sell on a night without a band. Assuming you make a profit on a night without a band. 

 

But don't think it works like that. Most pubs are empty in January up to mid February, often empty midweek. So they must make money seasonally and at weekends. 

 

If you drew 100 people in and they drank 4 pints each, that might just make up for zero sales Monday to Thursday. 

[Downunderwonder]

The night of the week doesn't factor in the band value calculation.

 

It goes something like this:

 

(Sales - costs, with no band) vs (Sales - costs with band on). Monday sales have no influence on the sums for Friday. ''Keeping the lights on'' costs are fixed. Product costs are relative to sales. Band cost is ( usually) fixed.

 

Staff costs really should go up with band, or they are paying too many staff the rest of the time and it's not a factor. Bar is quids in if they get the regular staff running when a band is on.

 

For the sake of making the numbers easy let's assume staffing is always commensurate with the level of trade. The cost per pint is less when they are busy because the ''keep lights on'' costs are the same every night.

 

'TimR's Monday night' doesn't hold to the staff commensurate condition. The busy nights effectively have a portion of Monday night's staff and 'lights on' overhead attached to them. But those costs are fixed whether the band is there or not.

 

Some places make a go of having a top notch band on Fri Sat and a fool on a stool or a quiz or poker or something the rest of the week. Those are the gigs every band wants but they only go to the ones that keep the punters happy. The bar expects to be busy. The band expects to be paid.

 

More complicated is the bar that has occasional bands vs football and juke box barman. Costs per pint on a busy band night is then very much in the bar's favour, but it has to be, to ''keep the lights on''.

 

So in a weird way Tim is wrong but also right.

 

[SteveXFR]

Maybe if you're terrible people will buy more booze in the hope you'll sound decent when they're better lubricates.

[uk_lefty]

Dividing profit out by the number of pints sold is just an easy way of conceptualising it, especially if pints are what they sell most of. Then it's easy to think up how much extra you need to do to be able to pay the bills and brewery fees for the next month or close down 

[Dan Dare]

38 minutes ago, SteveXFR said:

Maybe if you're terrible people will buy more booze in the hope you'll sound decent when they're better lubricates.

I always tell an audience "Remember, the more you drink, the better the music sounds and the better looking your partner becomes".

[Lozz196]

A drunken landlady once told us in our old punk covers band that we used to bring an extra £3000 over the bar. We definitely sent the punters to drink.

[Nail Soup]

1 hour ago, Downunderwonder said:

 

So in a weird way Tim is wrong but also right.

 

If ever there was a candidate for a universally applicable comment to recap any thread 😃!

[gapiro]

4 hours ago, Downunderwonder said:

I think on average you have to sell 3x the cost of the band to cover the band and the extra staff costs. Keep the place pumping for an extra hour and you know you're good value.

This is the usual maths used in catering industry. 3x ingredient cost for sales cost of food. It works out as a good rule of thumb as the assumption is that you have low paid staff when you're selling cheap food 

[TimR]

2 hours ago, Downunderwonder said:

For the sake of making the numbers easy let's assume staffing is always commensurate with the level of trade.

 

That's a massive assumption. Frequently my local has someone manning the bar for the whole day. Say from 11am to 11pm. 12 hours. Minimum wage that's £120 before any overheads, rent, lighting, heating, etc. 

At £2.50 profit per pint. They'd have to sell 48 pints just to cover the staff costs after NI and Tax. Every Monday to Thursday.

 

If they have a chef in as well, that's more wages. 

 

That's just not how businesses run. Some days they'll have no customers at all, other days (band nights) they'll be full and covering their losses for the rest of the week.

 

I've been in at 9pm on a Sunday night and been the only person there. 

 

My other Local doesn't open Mondays and Tuesdays, as they make such a loss. 

Edited November 15, 2021 by TimR

[Downunderwonder]

2 minutes ago, TimR said:

 

That's a massive assumption. Frequently my local has someone manning the bar for the whole day. Say from 11am to 11pm. 12 hours. Minimum wage that's £120 before any overheads, rent, lighting, heating, etc. 

At £2.50 profit per pint. They'd have to sell 48 pints just to cover the staff costs after NI and Tax. Every Monday to Thursday.

 

If they have a chef in as well, that's more wages. 

 

That's just not how businesses run. Some days they'll have no customers at all, other days (band nights) they'll be full and covering their losses for the rest of the week.

 

I've been in at 9pm on a Sunday night and been the only person there. 

That's just more of what I was at pains to point out after that quote that all makes cost per pint served a lousy metric in the band v no band calculation. 

[Downunderwonder]

The bar manager has to have a much better handle on his comings and goings than average costs per pint served. Otherwise they might miss out on opportunities to profit from spending on bands!

[Stub Mandrel]

Last gig I did, the landlord was pleased because he had so many new faces in.

 

It's partly about developing reputation and repeat custom.

[toneknob]

Most pub bands I play in tend to engender heavy drinking in the audients anyway

 

[41Hz]

2 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

Last gig I did, the landlord was pleased because he had so many new faces in.

 

It's partly about developing reputation and repeat custom.

Yeah I suspect that has something to do with the overall equation. Was surprised at our last gig when the landlord gave us an extra £100 over what was agreed and wanted to rebook even when it wasn’t particularly rammed, but then again I don’t know what a typical Saturday night without a band would have been like.

[TimR]

11 minutes ago, 41Hz said:

Yeah I suspect that has something to do with the overall equation. Was surprised at our last gig when the landlord gave us an extra £100 over what was agreed and wanted to rebook even when it wasn’t particularly rammed, but then again I don’t know what a typical Saturday night without a band would have been like.

 

Many years ago, this happened to us on Friday night. I was playing in a function band and suggested we did a few pub gigs as they'd probably lead to more gigs. The rest of the band were against playing pubs.  (But I think we ended up picking up a gig wedding/dnd/birthday  practically everytime we played)

 

People in the audience were phoning their friends up and telling them to come down, the place was rammed.

 

The regulars usually talk to the bar staff and tell them to rebook if they like you and/or you're better than the usual bands they see. Then word gets around and next time the audience is bigger. 

 

We never went back, because- "We don't do pub gigs..." There's no telling some people.

 

 

 

Edited November 16, 2021 by TimR

[Maude]

On 15/11/2021 at 17:49, TimR said:

If you don't want to discuss things why come here? 

 

On 15/11/2021 at 16:13, TimR said:

 I was the only person in (the pub) last night.

 

Can you think of any reason for that @TimR? 

😉

 

[Bassfinger]

Our band very recently had exactly this conversation with the landlady at our home gig.  She reckoned that for every £250 she paid out on a band she would want to see an extra £1000 minimum going over the bar.  The last gig we did for her the bar actually ran out of glasses at one point, and she was delighted with that. She owns the pub and I have no clue what her client status is with the breweries.

 

We charge £250 to the pubs that book us regularly, £350 to others. Between £500 to a grand for weddings etc, but its rare we do them, and actually turned one down recently because we didn't want to do 2 gigs in a week (were all elderly and need an early night now and again.)

Edited November 16, 2021 by Bassfinger
Alien sex experiments

[TimR]

55 minutes ago, Maude said:

 

 

Can you think of any reason for that @TimR? 

😉

 

No. We usually have very long discussions. The landlord is a Hong Kong Chinese and a rabbid communist. There's an artist who is a marxist,  a bank trader who is a Labour/Conservative swing voter, a guy with a degree in politics who runs his own business and is as Conservative as they come, plus a load of other assorted characters. Nurse, artic truck driver, a cabbie. It's usually very lively on a Friday and Saturday. Just not on a Sunday. 

 

I don't get people who think discussions are arguments and try and close them down. Odd. 

 

Edited November 16, 2021 by TimR

[Stub Mandrel]

31 minutes ago, TimR said:

1 hour ago, Maude said:

 

 

Can you think of any reason for that @TimR? 

😉

 

No. We usually have very long discussions. The landlord is a Hong Kong Chinese and a rabbid communist. There's an artist who is a marxist,  a bank trader who is a Labour/Conservative swing voter, a guy with a degree in politics who runs his own business and is as Conservative as they come, plus a load of other assorted characters. Nurse, artic truck driver, a cabbie. It's usually very lively on a Friday and Saturday. Just not on a Sunday. 

 

Sounds like you are trapped inside a TV sitcom that only goes out on Fridays and repeats on Saturdays.

[Maude]

53 minutes ago, TimR said:

No. We usually have very long discussions. The landlord is a Hong Kong Chinese and a rabbid communist. There's an artist who is a marxist,  a bank trader who is a Labour/Conservative swing voter, a guy with a degree in politics who runs his own business and is as Conservative as they come, plus a load of other assorted characters. Nurse, artic truck driver, a cabbie. It's usually very lively on a Friday and Saturday. Just not on a Sunday. 

 

I don't get people who think discussions are arguments and try and close them down. Odd. 

 

 

I was only messing with you, hence the winky face. 

I guess some like to discuss/debate more than others. 

 

21 minutes ago, Stub Mandrel said:

Sounds like you are trapped inside a TV sitcom that only goes out on Fridays and repeats on Saturdays.

 

You've lost me there I'm afraid. 

[TimR]

9 minutes ago, Maude said:

You've lost me there I'm afraid. 

Was aimed at me. 

 

I suppose it is really. But discussions change depending on what's happening. 

 

Probably similar in many commuter belt pubs around London. 

 

The other pub is more of a locals pub, its full of middle aged men complaining about stuff, but I can take my dog in there.

 

 

Edited November 16, 2021 by TimR

[TimR]

10 minutes ago, Maude said:

was only messing with you, hence the winky face. 

I guess some like to discuss/debate more than others. 

 

Yes. I realised that. Just thought it was worth discussing. 🤣

[Steve Browning]

Discussion is good. It is when the method used gives the impression someone considers themselves superior to others that hackles start to rise.

[TimR]

3 minutes ago, Steve Browning said:

Discussion is good. It is when the method used gives the impression someone considers themselves superior to others that hackles start to rise.

 Or when people give apparently sarcastic responses.

[Steve Browning]

15 minutes ago, TimR said:

 Or when people give apparently sarcastic responses.

Of course. Communication by word alone (even with emojis) is always going to be open to misinterpretation.