***Beauty photo I found on Flickr, eh?***
Alright, I thought I had already outlined my thoughts on St. Patrick’s Day in the years past but I can’t find mention of it, so here it is.
Now, I generally don’t go out for St. Patrick’s Day. I don’t really feel the need to wait in line for a bar on a weekday just to have a beer. Heck, if it’s on the weekend, no problem.
But let’s talk about the lineups to the bar for a moment. I think bars should have some sort of ‘frequent visitor’ club card of sorts.
The way it would work is the following…let’s say you visit the Heart and Crown quite a few times in a year. Let’s even say it’s twice a week, every week, for the year. One would assume that with a client such as this, you would want to honour them on St. Patrick’s Day by being able to let him through the massive lineup into the establishment. I’m not saying that he needs a place to sit and eat, but at least let him in without the hassle of a lineup.
So I think that bars should implement the frequent visitor card where (and I love the age of computers for this…) every day that you purchase an item at the pub, your name gets a little check mark in the database. Then, at the end of the year, they tally all the check marks and they release a list with a Top 100 Visitors, or a Top 100 Guest List on St. Patrick’s Day. You would be guaranteed to not have to wait in line if you show up to the door. Heck, for the Top 10, you could even have a table reserved for them.
As a pub owner, I think there is something to be said for reserving a spot for your regulars. Sure, you get a massive influx of people who just want to party like it’s…St. Patrick’s Day, but you should think about how much your regulars give to your business compared to the random people coming through your door for potentially one day of the year.
Now, some might say that reserving a table for people is a little silly on St. Patrick’s Day so perhaps there would be a variation on the theme like “Your table is reserved until 6PM and your guest list reservations are valid until 10PM.” That way, if you miss out on the table, you can still skip the line until 10PM. Chances are, if you aren’t there by 10PM knowing full well that you can avoid the lineup, then it’s your own problem if you waltz in there around 10:05PM and have to wait in a two hour lineup.
So what do people think of the idea? I think I should market this. Let’s be honest…this is probably implemented in some ways for the regulars. If you were Norm going to Cheers on St. Patrick’s Day, there’s no way he would wait in line.
Anyhow, I hope everyone has at least one beer on this fine day where we celebrate all those good looking Irish lasses out there. They are the cream of the crop.