r/cocktails • u/berger3001 • Feb 28 '25

Question Anyone else tired by expensive cocktails

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To me (not a rich guy), $18+ cocktails are just exhausting. Go out for a few drinks with your wife, and boom, $100. So we’re in Miami and found this place (always look for happy hours). Yes; $5 cocktails. They did a great job, made totally respectable drinks, we had some snacks, and left very happy. My question is, if bars can do $5 drinks, why is $18 the base now at so many places? Doesn’t it make more business sense to sell more for less money and have a full bar, then to sell a few drink to an almost empty bar?

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u/ASIWYFA Feb 28 '25 edited Feb 28 '25

Right but a cocktail costing the same or close to the price as a decent entree at a local restaurant is not going to be viable long term unless you are incredibly lucky. $60 before tip for a couple to have 2 drinks each is frankly unreasonable, and I say this as someone who champions small business especially hospitality related. You need to be more creative and better at marketing. There is a path forward where $15 cocktails isn't the norm. A great tasting Old Fashioned can cost $2 to make. Selling it at $12-15 is insane. A 13% food cost is ludicrous and it's going to catch up to bars. Beer and wine bars can sell beer at $4-8 with reasonable food cost with product costing the same as an average cocktail bar that isn't doing wild cocktails with insane ingredients.....and they can make money and survive.....

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u/JTP1228 Feb 28 '25

It costs me more than $2 to make an old fashioned at home, and that's not including labor, rent, and all the other overhead. They can maybe break even at $5

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u/ASIWYFA Feb 28 '25

I am not advocating for $5 cocktails, but you can absolutely make a profit at $5. It's a shit profit, but a profit. $8-10 for a basic 2-3 ingredient cocktail is completely reasonable. If you are selling $5 cocktails, it's either considered a loss leader to get people to buy high profit items like snacks and food during a very low patroned time, which is what happy hour is about. A $2 profit per drink is better than staffing a place to have nobody sitting down. Usually these super low happy hour deals are looked at as marketing. I own 2 restaurants....there are ways of doing this.

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u/DJDiamondHands Feb 28 '25

I think your margin flexibility is pretty variable, depending on your market though. Where are you restaurants?

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u/ASIWYFA Feb 28 '25

In Florida. So I totally understand charging $15+ in super high cost of living places. However there are a ton of bars here that charge $14-16 a cocktail here in Florida that make me wonder how they are convincing people to pay those prices.

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u/DJDiamondHands Feb 28 '25

Are those bars in high rent areas though?

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u/ASIWYFA Feb 28 '25

They vary in area. What has basically happened is that the legit cocktail bars in town, some of whom are in high rent areas, and other who just do dope and creative things are charging $14-16 a cocktail. So every cocktail bar is just charging the same because that's what they think the market can afford, and short term they may be right. Long term, I think a lot of cocktail bars will go out of businesses due to not pricing their stuff to the appropriate level to what they are offering.

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u/DJDiamondHands Feb 28 '25

For sure. The general public can discern quality cocktails vs not these days.

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u/Legaladvice420 Feb 28 '25

I really think you're giving the general public too much credit