The Daily Rail: Time to start training your staff in responsible alcohol service

Today's Specials

UNDER 60 SECONDS: What are eSports? [VIDEO]

While sports bars and restaurants are keen on showing traditional sports, eSports remains a relatively untapped market. Learn what eSports are and get an overview on what the competitive gaming market looks today and predictions for the future.

This is the first in a series of videos that explain the eSports market and help guide sports bars and restaurants into breaking into the industry, connect to eSports fans and tap into the competitive gaming market.

SUMMER, SUMMER, SUMMERTIME! (Sponsored up Upserve)

Why it’s important to you:  For restaurants, is summertime really easy living?

At the end of the day, you can develop the perfect menu and reach every potential guest with the best marketing campaign around… but you can’t change seasonality. Seasonality impacts each restaurant differently. In fact, some seasonal ebbs and flows may end up bringing more guests in the door…


Trump Force One vs. Air Force Once

Describing Donald Trump's personal 757-200 jet as "impressive" would certainly be an understatement. The luxurious jet (dubbed Trump Force One) is fitted out with gold-plated seatbelt buckles and a 52-inch flatscreen TV, among many other features. Trump bought the aircraft in from Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and it is estimated to have cost $100 million. How does it compare to the VC-25A, the aircraft used by the U.S. president?

Operating under the Air Force One callsign when the president is onboard, the VC-25A is larger, seating 70 passengers compared to Trump Force One's 43. It also has a longer range and a whole host of equipment to keep the president and his or her entourage safe at all times. If Trump does end up travelling regularly on Air Force One, he probably won't mind exchanging his gold seatbelt buckle for the presidential suite on one of the world's most sophisticated airliners. This infographic was recently featured on Forbes.Write here...

Infographic: Trump Force One Vs. Air Force One | Statista
You will find more statistics at Statista


Why it’s important to you: Cuz Tony Hawk, duh!

Tony Hawk was a true pioneer in the sport of skateboarding. He dominated the game for years and then turned himself into a true brand. Seventeen years ago he landed the first 900 (that’s 2.5 revolutions) during a skateboard in competition. At the time it was a record, although a 12 year old landed a 1080 in 2012. Hawk decided on Monday he was going to pull another 900 — this time at age 48. The guy has grit and the outcome is really entertaining. Here’s to you Tony Hawk may you be pulling turns until the wheels fall off!


Why it’s important to you: Isn’t it time we grew up?

You would hope that a woman can be judged by her accomplishments and not her appearance in 2016, but those hopes were recently dashed by researchers in France. In a study done at the Sorbonne in Paris, researchers responded to hundreds of ads using two fictional female characters. One wore a low cut blouse and the other a neck-high conservative top. I bet you can guess which person received more interview offers? Yup, the cleavage images got 62 more offers than the conservative ones. It would almost be funny if it weren’t such a sad comment on our culture.


Why it’s important to you: Alcohol service is a risk factor for your business.

Have you ever seen a guest leave your restaurant and think, “That guy has had too much to drink!” Did you do anything about it? It was this exact scenario that occurred when Myles Macintosh left a pub in Sasaktoon (Canada). In Macintosh’s case, he was 86’d from the bar for being too intoxicated. No one was with him as he left. In his drunken state, he wandered into the local river and drowned. It’s a horrible story that could have been avoided if the staff had taken some additional steps to protect him from himself. 

It’s a sad reality that some folks don’t moderate their behavior, but if they walk into your place and have a drink, they are your responsibility. As a result of this avoidable tragedy, the community is now requiring Responsible Alcohol Service training for all servers in bars and restaurants. This has always been a beef with our industry that would leave you scratching your head. We make significant sales and profit from alcohol, why aren’t we training our staff without statutory requirements forcing us? Can you imagine getting on a plane with a pilot that was untrained? Well booze kills far more folks than planes, so it stands to reason we should be better training our personnel.


Why it’s important to you: You will be deciding who will be our next president.

There is no doubt that mistakes were made on September 11, 2012. The four Americans that lost their lives that night worked in a dangerous place at a dangerous time. But yesterday’s 800 page report only revealed a small number of revelations from the $7 Million spent in previous investigations. 

Chief among, Rep. Trey Gowdy’s (R-SC) claims were that the President failed to act on intelligence and that Ambassador Chris Stevens shares some of the blame. It was Stevens that determined to keep the Benghazi facility open, even after it was clear security was scant and the circumstances were dire. Ironically, the report fails to add any new insight into the performance of then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. No smoking guns, no whistleblowers and no new evidence of malfeasance on her part. The timing is curious…just days ahead of the two party’s conventions, but the report really does land with a thud. It’s clear that the administration blew it with their Sunday news show claims of “insults to Islam” as the cause of the attack, but equally no investigation has proven the tragedy avoidable. So, what’s next? Maybe it’s time to honor those that died, by getting on with resolving our differences and building a better America.