So
you think you can make a drink
Although fun, tending bar with "flair" is one
serious business by
Susan Campbell
You
probably first witnessed "flair" bartending watching Tom
Cruise perform in the movie Cocktail and later in Coyote Ugly where
wild women blow alcohol-fueled fire breath and set the bar ablaze.
But flair bartending is much more than that.
Jackie
Vides demonstrates some tricky bottle flips at Montreal's Absolute
Bartending School. What made her enter this largely male-dominated
milieu? "I already had good bartending chops," she says,
"but when my older brother became proficient at flair, I thought,
why should he be having all the fun and making all the money? So,
I followed in his footsteps. Now, my tips have tripled and I have
a great regular following."
However,
many bar owners are wary of bottle-flipping, fire-lighting bartenders.
Chris Natale, the school's founder, comments, "Management needs
to be finessed into flair. They worry about breakage, spillage and
insurance. And, there are bartenders who can juggle but can't make
a proper drink to save their souls, which gives us all a bad name.
You have to prove yourself a great all-round barkeep from day one;
being proficient at flair is only part of it."
What
about bottle breakage? Enter Niagara's Dean Serneels who founded
Flairco Inc., producer of the world's first shatterproof flair bottle.
Dean says, "I invented the Flairco bottle because I needed
it." Turns out a lot of bartenders around the world also needed
it. Today, Flairco regularly supplies their trademarked shatterproof
bottles to twenty-five different countries. Companies like Skyy
vodka and Bols have also got onboard to create their own flair-friendly
designs, and a Flairco beer bottle is now in the works.
Beyond
entertaining your customers, there are many additional benefits
to becoming proficient at flair. Vancouver's Scott Young, a pioneer
in the industry, is an extreme example of that. Scott has coined
the term "Extreme Bartending" for what he does. He has
taken it a step further by creating a cottage industry out of making
training videos, DVDs, books and on-site courses teaching his extreme
moves. He and his company www.extremebartending.com also travel
the globe conducting seminars.
This
trend is no flash in the pan. Flair bartenders are in big demand
to perform at trade shows and to promote products for big liquor
companies. And then there are the competitions.
You certainly get your fair share of split lips and bruises while
practicing flair bartending
and you must be careful when playing with fire obviously.
Flair
competitor Shawn Greco of the Roxx bar in Barrie spends roughly
fifteen hours weekly practicing at least two months before competing
in global events. And he's not alone. Shawn says, "Canada does
very well on an international level. I'm lucky. The Roxx bar is
one of the few in the country that actively promotes flair. It's
a perfect place to constantly improve your skills."
Ryan
Smyth, bartending instructor of the Toronto Institute of Bartending
(TIB) continues, "There is no real epicenter for flair in Canada,
so Team Canada is spread coast-to-coast. The acclaim is definitely
important and as flair continues to grow, so do the rewards. Believe
it or not, some competitions now offer $25,000 US in prize money."
But
it's not all about bottle gymnastics. Flair can be an all-encompassing
word for anything additional a bartender brings to the job such
as magic tricks, super speed, and cocktail creativity.
Gavin
MacMillan, flair instructor at TIB states, "Flair bartending
is the evolution of the bartender. We teach our bartenders to study
mixology, and to incorporate movement to create entertainment in
a place where entertainment hasn't traditionally existed."
Although
these experts cannot seem to agree whether flair is sport or art,
they do concur that the opportunity to represent your country in
global events is an amazing experience.
They
all also agree on some very fundamental flair rules:
- Know your drinks first, learn flair second
Think service first, flair second. (Never impede service to simply
show off.)
- Never practice at work. (Only do moves you have mastered at work.)
- Spillage of alcohol is unacceptable. (As is setting your customers
on fire.)
Have fun!
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