5 Months

5 Months is a long time in bartending. Ive been so busy but meaning to update this for awhile, but been racked with work all the time, Im sure everyones aware of how it gets. Ive finally finished the Bar Book for Blythswood, in about 10 hours from the time this post is published, I will be at the bookbinders finalising it all. Its become a bit of an albatross recentley, and I cant wait to get it on the tables at last......then I can start working on the next one !! Keep your eyes on my Facebook page, I will be uploading the entire book on my profile page and here over the next week.
So much time and effort has gone into to making it right that I havent been able to put the thing to bed and finally stop tinkering with it. Even yesterday, I was tweaking with design elements and page layout, If I kept tweaking it until it was perfect then it would never see the light of day.
There are a few things I could be happier with, and even though Ive went through it with a fine comb, Im sure Bruce Borthwick will pick up on the one spelling or ABV% error in there Ive managed to miss.
In the past five months, we were honoured to be nominated for Hotel Bar Of The Year at the Class Awards, a great effort at under a year old, and at the recent SLTN Awards, we took home Spirits Bar Of The Year, Mixologist Of The Year, and our Chairman Peter Taylor took home the Industry Achievement Award. I had my eye on that one, but I reckon he pipped me to it. :)

We're also taking on a few new bartenders over the next month as unfortunately Dean Evans is leaving us. Dean has been an inspiration to both myself and all the team with his technique, proffesionalism and knowledge. Saturday nights in The Salon just wont be the same without him.
Its hard to lose such a core member of your team, the bar program at Blythswood was built around guys like Scott & Dean, so to lose someone so integral is tough. Im fortunate that I have such a strong team though, Martyn & Emily have both been giants in the last 2 months, and although Im gutted at losing Dean, having guys like Emily, Martyn, Scott & Andy there makes me confident that we wont suffer.
The new cocktail list will be a challenge on everyone. We're upping our game substantially from where we started off, so its not going to get any easier !! Ive never worked in such a busy bar before in all my career, and if theres a busier bar in glasgow then I really sympathise for them. We've sold over 40,000 cocktails since opening in November last year, and up until 2 months ago, that figure stood at 25,000. We've went from the Salon being a 2 Station bar, to a 3 Station, and in the next month it will become a 4 station bar manned by 5 bartenders.
In the meantime, Ive got the Whisky Picnic on Sunday the 21st, hope you've managed to RSVP in time to get a place, we're expecting over 400 people this year, all in support of raising Mens Health Awarness. Remember to be donning your best tweed, mo and malt whisky, hope to see you all there !!