Why do so many shops require alcohol? Neither my husband or I drink so it rules out so many shops. It isn't even just the dining, but bowling, movies, and other places that would give us a nice night out. Does anyone else have this issue? Anyone come up with way to meet order requirements without actually drinking that isn't obvious?

I'm hoping to eventually work up to some hotel shops. Will I even be able yo or do they all require alcohol as well? I don't mind sitting at the bar with a coke...

Thanks.

It depends on the situation. If they are trying to see whether the server/bartender offers a refill, you must consume more than half the drink. If the focus is speed of original service (like a server on a casino floor) sometimes the scheduler will allow non-alcoholic drink service. It never hurts to ask if you can order a virgin daquri, for example.

Many hotel shops of the "audit" variety do not require a bar visit.

I drink. Where are you located? I'll be your drinking buddy

If they don't require you to drink half then just take a sip or order something watered down.

If you're not sitting at a bar you can always take your drink to the bathroom and dump it out.

This has been discussed here a few times before, and is very polarizing because some people say you can just go dump the drink, and others like me think the companies want you to get the drink so you can actually critique the drink and bartenders of the establishment. You will get a wide range of opinions here. Also, I am pretty sure you will find we all agree to disagree on this.

My take, if you don't drink you should not take an alcohol required shop. Just like if you are a vegetarian you should not take a burger shop where you need to taste the food.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/23/2019 09:18PM by oteixeira.

Not having the required one or two drinks for a bar audit would tell me I'm not right for the job...pour the drink down the drain, no, not advised, who takes a drink to the restroom? I usually drink half, then I have to order a different drink, which is a problem, I don't like to mix drinks. I have said,after taken several sips, this is too sweet, let me try another. I just do one place now, due to a short drive home, but this place requires two drinks.

Coyle does not require that you drink. That's one of the reason I do so many shops for them. (I did not mean to like my own post!)

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/23/2019 05:00PM by Niner.

If you don't want to drink, you can take a totally different approach:

Instead of doing the restaurant as a shop, pic up a couple of banks, apartments, etc. to earn the price of a meal. Then, go out with your spouse and simply enjoy a nice meal out. You'll enjoy the meal more, not having to be restricted by menu items, having to time service,, trying to get names, etc.

I guess I should clarify my post saying I thought it was OK to pass on drinking a required alcoholic drink. I would NEVER do this at a bar shop. However, the OP mentioned places like bowling alleys or movie theaters where you would take your beverage to outside the bar area anyway.

But like you said, everyone interprets guidelines differently. Take what you like and leave the rest.

@oteixeira wrote:

This has been discussed here a few times before, and is very polarizing because some people say you can just go dump the drink, and others like me think the companies want you to get the drink so you can actually critique the drink and bartenders of the establishment. You will get a wide range of onions here. Also, I am pretty sure you will find we all agree to disagree on this.

My take, if you don't drink you should not take an alcohol required shop. Just like if you are a vegetarian you should not take a burger shop where you need to taste the food.

@oteixeira wrote:

My take, if you don't drink you should not take an alcohol required shop. Just like if you are a vegetarian you should not take a burger shop where you need to taste the food.

1000X yes.
If you order a Coke on a bar audit, expect to get it rejected.

I just realized I was auto-corrected to onions from opinions. Thank God this wasn't a shop form. LOL

The shops that require alcohol do so because the client wants the alcoholic drinks to be evaluated. It is that simple. Alcohol is a huge profit center for restaurants.

Most of the hotel shops that I have seen include a visit to the bar. The answer again that the client wants the bar evaluated. Why? Because alcohol is a huge profit center.

Generally, but not always, they want an alcoholic drink to be ordered, and then they want to know if the bartender asked if you want a refill. Soft drinks are generally just refilled for free. Sometimes a second and different drink if required. The ones that are hardest for me are the ones where I am expected to identify what other patrons are ordering based upon what ingredients the bartender is using.

@jewelbeth wrote:

Why do so many shops require alcohol?

I'm hoping to eventually work up to some hotel shops. Will I even be able yo or do they all require alcohol as well? I don't mind sitting at the bar with a coke...

Thanks.

@jewelbeth wrote:

Why do so many shops require alcohol? Neither my husband or I drink so it rules out so many shops. It isn't even just the dining, but bowling, movies, and other places that would give us a nice night out. Does anyone else have this issue? Anyone come up with way to meet order requirements without actually drinking that isn't obvious?

I'm hoping to eventually work up to some hotel shops. Will I even be able yo or do they all require alcohol as well? I don't mind sitting at the bar with a coke...

Thanks.

A popular sports bar shops requires a purchase of beer. I don't drink beer and stopped taking the shops because of the beer requirements. I got an email a while back offering a bonus to purchase the required beer then any alcoholic beverage of my choice if I wished. I agreed.

You can tell the quality of a glass of wine without putting it in your mouth.

Feel the cork. If it's damp, it was stored correctly, on it's side.

Swirl the glass. The residue on the inside of the glass is the legs. This tells you the sugar content. The thicker the legs, the higher the sugar. The higher the sugar, the higher the alcohol content.

Swirl the glass again, but this time with your hand over the top. Put your nose in it. That will give you the flavor profile: oaky, jammy, stone, etc.

Now, hold your glass up to a light background. The more dense the color, the longer it's been aged.

Now, set the glass aside and enjoy your meal. This method will work in a wine glass at a restaurant, not in a plastic cup at a bowling alley.

Au contraire, as they would say in France. The yeast that makes the alcohol does so by consuming the sugar in the original pressing (proto-wine). In general, if a wine's alcohol content is 10% or less it will have sweet characteristics. Wines that are even lower (especially down around 8 or 9 percent) will definitely be sweet. Wines in the 11% to 12.5% ABV range are considered 'off-dry' meaning that there is some notable residual sugar. I also disagree with your statement about color and time of aging. Different wines have different colors. Again, in general, a pinot noir will be lighter in color than a cabernet savignon. A darker color in a white wine often (but not always) means that the wine is well past its prime.

@HonnyBrown wrote:

Swirl the glass. The residue on the inside of the glass is the legs. This tells you the sugar content. The thicker the legs, the higher the sugar. The higher the sugar, the higher the alcohol content.

I drink but I am an easy drunk and one drink is enough for me ( I was always a cheap date even for my husband). But my husband liked two so I would actually order the drink before he arrived from the parking lot, restroom or somewhere and drink part of it and than allow him to drink the rest. We were too far from 21 to be carded so that part did not matter. The glass was usually somewhere between us on the table/bar. And if the bar was before dinner we would usually get our table and bring that first drink into the dining room which was never an issue on a dinner shop I had.
If you have a good friend who does drink and your drink order is in the bar and then on to the dining room you might just invite your friend to meet you in the bar for a free drink..then do the same and take a small sip and let your friend nurse it and finish it. Then say goodbye see ya later and go into dinner with hubby. The second drink on the table is easier to fake if you are willing to drink just a bit..you can always water it down first and drink some and then leave the rest.
Last night I was talking with a friend who worked in a high end restaurant where some bottles of wine were $1500. She said often people would order one of those expensive bottles and just not finish them. They would take them back to the kitchen with at least one glass still left and save them up and have a servers party once in a while. The management was aware and joined in. So do not feel you need to actually finish your drink. If they are looking for refills tho you will need to finish a lot of it.

We have a radio announcer in town that uses the phrase "Speak your onions" all the time. Evidently he borrowed it from another announcer.

@oteixeira wrote:

I just realized I was auto-corrected to onions from opinions. Thank God this wasn't a shop form. LOL

Unfortunately, I can't drink any of it. The old "One is too many...". I guess I will just have to miss out on a good portion of dining shops. Oh well. Glad to hear it may not be an issue as I work up to hotels.

Sorry you are going to miss out. MFJ had a great suggestion of doing a couple of extra shops to pay for the dinner. I might just do that after reading the thread about someone needing 10 names on a shop.

As a side note, I have done shops where I've had to go order a drink with dinner because they wanted to see if the bartender was free pouring or using a jigger.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/2019 02:06PM by kimmiemae.

@jewelbeth wrote:

Unfortunately, I can't drink any of it. The old "One is too many...". I guess I will just have to miss out on a good portion of dining shops. Oh well. Glad to hear it may not be an issue as I work up to hotels.

My hubby also can't drink. I find a friend to take on bar shops, and only take no-bar hotel standards audits unless I am traveling alone. I feel your pain.

@HonnyBrown wrote:

You can tell the quality of a glass of wine without putting it in your mouth.

Feel the cork. If it's damp, it was stored correctly, on it's side.

Swirl the glass. The residue on the inside of the glass is the legs. This tells you the sugar content. The thicker the legs, the higher the sugar. The higher the sugar, the higher the alcohol content.

Swirl the glass again, but this time with your hand over the top. Put your nose in it. That will give you the flavor profile: oaky, jammy, stone, etc.

Now, hold your glass up to a light background. The more dense the color, the longer it's been aged.

Now, set the glass aside and enjoy your meal. This method will work in a wine glass at a restaurant, not in a plastic cup at a bowling alley.

And the server stands there waiting for you to take a sip like any normal person would ....

I actually do a restaurant shop every month where its required to drink the recommended margarita, which is usually heavy on the tequila. The MSC usually sends me on a lunch shop, meaning that I'm drinking alchohol during the middle of the day (not a great thing when you have additional work afterwards).

Given this, I usually sip about a third, if not half of the drink while also going heavy on the iced water. If I feel really fatigued, I'll order the house coffee when offered, even if its outside of my reimbursement from the MSC.

@jewelbeth wrote:

Unfortunately, I can't drink any of it. The old "One is too many...". I guess I will just have to miss out on a good portion of dining shops. Oh well. Glad to hear it may not be an issue as I work up to hotels.

There are plenty of other shops you can take. Please be careful with the hotel shops, most of them have a bar/alcohol requirement as well. I feel like you may want to change the type of shops you aim for, as hotels and restaurants would both put you in a bad spot. Good luck, and like I said, there is plenty of other work out there for you!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/2019 05:05PM by oteixeira.

You might not have to drink it. Some might ask if they offered a second round, but not all do. I once did pour a whiskey and coke down the drain during a shop. My husband will drink wine, but not a mixed drink. I don't drink at all.

As someone who primarily shops hotels, I can not think of a single assignment, for many of the numerous MSCs I work with, that does not require alcohol. If you don't/can't drink (both valid choices) don't plan on the hotel assignments, It will just frustrate you that you can't do them.
Plenty of lunch assignments across a variety of lovely restaurants do not require alcohol.

I have done plenty of hotel audits with no alcohol. Some had no bar or restaurant, others simply had a different audit focus. It just depends on the individual shop.

@SoCalMama wrote:

@HonnyBrown wrote:

This method will work in a wine glass at a restaurant, not in a plastic cup at a bowling alley.

And the server stands there waiting for you to take a sip like any normal person would ....

I'm with SCM. There's no way you could get away without taking sip on a fine dining assignment if you ordered a bottle and checked the cork....and I don't even want to touch that comment about darker color being related to aging. A main component of being a shopper is to be a 'normal' customer. Normal customers who order wine, drink wine.

If it makes you non-drinker feel any better, I have a lot of frustration with shops that don't allow alcohol. Pizza with no beer! What's the point of it?

Beer is so gross. ???? I've probably tried at least 100 different types of beers over 14 years and still haven't found one I can consume.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/25/2019 02:55PM by eyelove2shop.

I take a pretend sip if dinner requires a drink as I don't drink anymore either. Never a problem.