FruitOfTheVale
Superstar
Very long read below in the spoiler w/ anecdotes about my experiences as a bar-back and bartender in the Bay Area. If you're at all interested in the industry, you'll probably want to read it.
If y'all got questions about the industry, liquor recs, declaring tips/taxes or any other shyt just ask.
I know its some folks on here struggling to get a side hustle going... Bartending is a very solid side hustle if you don't got a record and you can let go of the weekend warrior fukkery. I'm primarily in a creative trade and I've been seriously putting in the effort to lay the groundwork to start my own business over the last year. The bar industry has enabled me to fund my other ventures (going back to finish my undergrad degree, business expenses, etc) in ways I never could have before and I'm saying this as someone with only a high school diploma to my name
For that matter, I didn't go to bartending school and didn't pay a dime for any bartending education... I took advantage of a free bartending program that was offered in Oakland. I go into more detail in the spoiler but it's offered in multiple cities around the country, if you're serious about getting a new side hustle check out what I wrote in the spoiler.
I signed up for a free bartending 101 certificate program a year and a half ago called ROC The Bay after I saw an ad for it posted in the West Oakland library. The program's mission is to increase the presence of non-whites in front-of-house roles in high end bars and restaurants that are almost exclusively held by white people. The program was hosted in downtown Oakland and lasted two and a half months: It was a crash course in basic mixology that covered a mix of theory and practice behind the bar. There was a final exam on the course material covered but it wasn't anything difficult as long as you kept up with the reading. I looked up the ROC website and apparently they have chapters all around the country, if any of ya'll want to add a bartending cert to your repertoire I recommend it
I linked the list of chapters below. Off rip I see LA, DC, NYC, Philly and Chicago all got chapters.
about Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) United
The reason I went into the program is because I went through a 9 month stretch of unemployment. In 2016 (A year before the free bar program) I landed a paid internship right as I was coming out of a non-degree film certificate program in SF. The internship lasted 4 months: I was not retained by the company. I attempted to break into fulltime freelance/contract film work but quickly realized that I had fukked up by not investing my internship money into upgrading my film equipment. More than that though, my networking skills at the time were not really up to par which made my lack of connections in the local film scene a problem. Thankfully, I was able to move back into my mama house instead of fukking up my credit trying to hold onto where I was living at. I eventually came to the conclusion that I needed a side hustle that would be dependable enough to cover rent but flexible enough to not dominate my schedule and allow me to focus on other things during the week. Thus, weekend bartending.
A month after I finished the bartending program, I got a call from the instructor asking me if I was interested in being a bar-back at the same bar she trained me at. Long story short, I bar-backed there for 6 months. Oddly enough, two days after I landed that job, I got a call from the film program I attended a year earlier asking if I was interested in being a part time lab instructor. I went from being unemployed to having two jobs
What a job it was though...
I worked weekends on the night shift from 6 to 2 AM (which in reality is 6 to 3 or 4 AM depending on how trashed the bar is afterwards). The bar was understaffed w/ only one main bartender for weekend rushes. I was inexperienced and was not able to finesse becoming the 2nd bartender. As a result, I spent the next 6 months finding out that the bar-back is the nikka job in the establishment
As in, me and the other bar-back were the only two nikkas in there. the head bartender who brought me in the place was a sista and she brought in the most regulars (this is Oakland we're talking about after all) but she had beef with the manager so the energy was always tense. Thankfully the clientele that she brought in was cool and the music we played on weekends attracted a blacker/more mixed crowd than a lot of the other bars in Uptown.
Bar-back work is very labor-intensive. Expect to be busting your ass for three to four-hour stretches non-stop when there's wall to wall customers... Expect to be lifting in excess of 50lbs regularly... Expect to not get home until 5 AM on the craziest nights. Setting up/breaking down wells, food running & bussing, managing to-go orders, glassware polishing & washing, restocking, switching beer kegs, prepping garnishes & juices, trash duty, etc. is all part of the job description. You're not there to conversate with the customers unless the bartender is too busy to take surplus drink orders. On the flipside, if you're able to do all of the above AND provide the best customer service you possibly can, you can usually finesse some decent tips from regulars.
The bar was inconsistently busy when I was working there. Best tips I ever made over there in one night was $210... that only happened on First Fridays (a big block party that happens once a month in downtown Oakland). On regular weekends, I made anywhere between $130 and $40. The bartender on the other hand was making $400-500 a night on the busiest nights
... that was 80% of what attracted me to the business in the first place lol. As a bar-back, though, my paychecks were straight 
status... When I filed my taxes the following year, I got a letter from the IRS because they didn't believe the amount that was being withheld from my checks.
The worst part of that job though was getting home after I was off. I was broke and had to ride the 801 (night bus) back home
. only people up at that time of night is knocks, dealers, security guards and nikkas getting off work like me. The shyt I saw and smelled over that 6 month period... The Bay is known for the bonafide 51-50 dopefiend vagabond shenanigans and let me tell you, they was out there on 14th and Broadway out front of Delauer's Newstand every. fukking. Night. That shyt deserves a thread by itself.
By Winter 2017, the money significantly slowed down from the Fall. Oakland is not no tourist destination and nikkas only go out like that when it's warm/not raining. I saw the writing on the wall that I wasn't gonna get promoted to being a bartender: the manager was looking to run the only black bartender out of there and I damn sure wasn't gonna be her replacement. My potna in SF was bar-backing at a fine dining joint in SF and he was about to leave (which created an opening). After 6 months, I quit the one in Oakland and started working in SF as a bar-back again. The minimum wage was $3 higher and business was waaay more regular at that spot than at my last bar. Come to find out, these mothafukkas did hella private buyout events where tipouts were regularly $300+. Most I ever made there was $373 in one night
But... The FOH (front of house) was all white due to a concerted effort by the white female GM to hire nothing but white college/high school girls as hosts and servers, it wasn't the same restaurant that my boy worked at by the time I got there
. I went into the job interview expressing that I was primarily interested in transitioning into a bartending role. Two months in though, I knew I was never gonna get promoted there either
. The clientele was also all white and not like the ones in Oakland, this was the upper middle class Leave it to Beaver crowd . One day, they hosted a private costume party that was attended by middle aged and older techies. Three old white techies showed up in Hip Hop blackface and spent the next two hours putting on a minstrel show by b*stardizing every Hip Hop lyric they could think of.
Long story short, the money was right but everything else was
. Unfortunately, the money was enough of a reason for me to stay there because I had just started my 1st semester at SF State after dropping out of undergrad five years ago. I worked there 9 months (my entire 1st semester and the majority of my 2nd semester), long enough for it to look good on my resume. I bounced at the beginning of Oct 2018 and put my resume out to 40+ bars over the course of a month. I had calculated my exit to coincide with the hiring boom for the holiday season in SF. In spite of that, I went a month w/o hearing from any of the places I applied to 
. By the end of the month since I quit the 2nd joint, I was beginning to think that the odds of being a black bartender was as bleak as the hiring statistics we learned about in the bartending program. In spite of that though I still felt good about my resume.
Then, two months ago out the blue, I got a call that led to me being a bartender at a fine dining restaurant.
Let me tell you... the difference between being a bartender vs a bar-back is night and fukking day. I literally work 1/3 as hard at my current job but make double the money. Putting it another way, I've been averaging $600 a week including tips and wages but I only work 18 hours/3 6hr shifts a week which amounts to $33 an hour 
As a bar-back at the other spot, I averaged $300-350 a week while working 16 hours with the exception of private events where I would make around 500 a week. The difference in the amount of labor I had to do though and the clientele I had to deal with while doing it...
The spot I work in is in the tourist section so I'm never the only black person in the building which sadly is very common in the fine dining world. Five of the 15 regular servers/cocktail servers are also black and they're all real bay area folk, I ain't detected no c00n sabotage antics aimed at me whatsoever
The money is not A1 status by Frisco standards at all - some people really out here making $600-800 a night
- but frankly, this is the first restaurant/bar I ever worked in where I didn't hate it within two months. I got 2.5 years in school left and this shyt right here is the easiest money I ever made in my life other than my other job as a lab instructor You better fukkin believe I ain't letting go
I linked the list of chapters below. Off rip I see LA, DC, NYC, Philly and Chicago all got chapters.about Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) United
The reason I went into the program is because I went through a 9 month stretch of unemployment. In 2016 (A year before the free bar program) I landed a paid internship right as I was coming out of a non-degree film certificate program in SF. The internship lasted 4 months: I was not retained by the company. I attempted to break into fulltime freelance/contract film work but quickly realized that I had fukked up by not investing my internship money into upgrading my film equipment. More than that though, my networking skills at the time were not really up to par which made my lack of connections in the local film scene a problem. Thankfully, I was able to move back into my mama house instead of fukking up my credit trying to hold onto where I was living at. I eventually came to the conclusion that I needed a side hustle that would be dependable enough to cover rent but flexible enough to not dominate my schedule and allow me to focus on other things during the week. Thus, weekend bartending.
A month after I finished the bartending program, I got a call from the instructor asking me if I was interested in being a bar-back at the same bar she trained me at. Long story short, I bar-backed there for 6 months. Oddly enough, two days after I landed that job, I got a call from the film program I attended a year earlier asking if I was interested in being a part time lab instructor. I went from being unemployed to having two jobs
What a job it was though...
I worked weekends on the night shift from 6 to 2 AM (which in reality is 6 to 3 or 4 AM depending on how trashed the bar is afterwards). The bar was understaffed w/ only one main bartender for weekend rushes. I was inexperienced and was not able to finesse becoming the 2nd bartender. As a result, I spent the next 6 months finding out that the bar-back is the nikka job in the establishment
As in, me and the other bar-back were the only two nikkas in there. the head bartender who brought me in the place was a sista and she brought in the most regulars (this is Oakland we're talking about after all) but she had beef with the manager so the energy was always tense. Thankfully the clientele that she brought in was cool and the music we played on weekends attracted a blacker/more mixed crowd than a lot of the other bars in Uptown.Bar-back work is very labor-intensive. Expect to be busting your ass for three to four-hour stretches non-stop when there's wall to wall customers... Expect to be lifting in excess of 50lbs regularly... Expect to not get home until 5 AM on the craziest nights. Setting up/breaking down wells, food running & bussing, managing to-go orders, glassware polishing & washing, restocking, switching beer kegs, prepping garnishes & juices, trash duty, etc. is all part of the job description. You're not there to conversate with the customers unless the bartender is too busy to take surplus drink orders. On the flipside, if you're able to do all of the above AND provide the best customer service you possibly can, you can usually finesse some decent tips from regulars.
The bar was inconsistently busy when I was working there. Best tips I ever made over there in one night was $210... that only happened on First Fridays (a big block party that happens once a month in downtown Oakland). On regular weekends, I made anywhere between $130 and $40. The bartender on the other hand was making $400-500 a night on the busiest nights
... that was 80% of what attracted me to the business in the first place lol. As a bar-back, though, my paychecks were straight status... When I filed my taxes the following year, I got a letter from the IRS because they didn't believe the amount that was being withheld from my checks.The worst part of that job though was getting home after I was off. I was broke and had to ride the 801 (night bus) back home
. only people up at that time of night is knocks, dealers, security guards and nikkas getting off work like me. The shyt I saw and smelled over that 6 month period... The Bay is known for the bonafide 51-50 dopefiend vagabond shenanigans and let me tell you, they was out there on 14th and Broadway out front of Delauer's Newstand every. fukking. Night. That shyt deserves a thread by itself.By Winter 2017, the money significantly slowed down from the Fall. Oakland is not no tourist destination and nikkas only go out like that when it's warm/not raining. I saw the writing on the wall that I wasn't gonna get promoted to being a bartender: the manager was looking to run the only black bartender out of there and I damn sure wasn't gonna be her replacement. My potna in SF was bar-backing at a fine dining joint in SF and he was about to leave (which created an opening). After 6 months, I quit the one in Oakland and started working in SF as a bar-back again. The minimum wage was $3 higher and business was waaay more regular at that spot than at my last bar. Come to find out, these mothafukkas did hella private buyout events where tipouts were regularly $300+. Most I ever made there was $373 in one night
But... The FOH (front of house) was all white due to a concerted effort by the white female GM to hire nothing but white college/high school girls as hosts and servers, it wasn't the same restaurant that my boy worked at by the time I got there
. I went into the job interview expressing that I was primarily interested in transitioning into a bartending role. Two months in though, I knew I was never gonna get promoted there either. The clientele was also all white and not like the ones in Oakland, this was the upper middle class Leave it to Beaver crowd . One day, they hosted a private costume party that was attended by middle aged and older techies. Three old white techies showed up in Hip Hop blackface and spent the next two hours putting on a minstrel show by b*stardizing every Hip Hop lyric they could think of.Long story short, the money was right but everything else was
. Unfortunately, the money was enough of a reason for me to stay there because I had just started my 1st semester at SF State after dropping out of undergrad five years ago. I worked there 9 months (my entire 1st semester and the majority of my 2nd semester), long enough for it to look good on my resume. I bounced at the beginning of Oct 2018 and put my resume out to 40+ bars over the course of a month. I had calculated my exit to coincide with the hiring boom for the holiday season in SF. In spite of that, I went a month w/o hearing from any of the places I applied to . By the end of the month since I quit the 2nd joint, I was beginning to think that the odds of being a black bartender was as bleak as the hiring statistics we learned about in the bartending program. In spite of that though I still felt good about my resume.Then, two months ago out the blue, I got a call that led to me being a bartender at a fine dining restaurant.
Let me tell you... the difference between being a bartender vs a bar-back is night and fukking day. I literally work 1/3 as hard at my current job but make double the money.
Putting it another way, I've been averaging $600 a week including tips and wages but I only work 18 hours/3 6hr shifts a week which amounts to $33 an hour As a bar-back at the other spot, I averaged $300-350 a week while working 16 hours with the exception of private events where I would make around 500 a week. The difference in the amount of labor I had to do though and the clientele I had to deal with while doing it... The spot I work in is in the tourist section so I'm never the only black person in the building which sadly is very common in the fine dining world. Five of the 15 regular servers/cocktail servers are also black and they're all real bay area folk, I ain't detected no c00n sabotage antics aimed at me whatsoever
The money is not A1 status by Frisco standards at all - some people really out here making $600-800 a night
- but frankly, this is the first restaurant/bar I ever worked in where I didn't hate it within two months. I got 2.5 years in school left and this shyt right here is the easiest money I ever made in my life other than my other job as a lab instructor You better fukkin believe I ain't letting goIf y'all got questions about the industry, liquor recs, declaring tips/taxes or any other shyt just ask.
I know its some folks on here struggling to get a side hustle going... Bartending is a very solid side hustle if you don't got a record and you can let go of the weekend warrior fukkery. I'm primarily in a creative trade and I've been seriously putting in the effort to lay the groundwork to start my own business over the last year. The bar industry has enabled me to fund my other ventures (going back to finish my undergrad degree, business expenses, etc) in ways I never could have before and I'm saying this as someone with only a high school diploma to my name
For that matter, I didn't go to bartending school and didn't pay a dime for any bartending education... I took advantage of a free bartending program that was offered in Oakland. I go into more detail in the spoiler but it's offered in multiple cities around the country, if you're serious about getting a new side hustle check out what I wrote in the spoiler.
for coming with the receipts about the side hustle...unlike these other Coli knee grows.
. The ones who don't have a substance abuse problem are few and far in-between... If you really tryna pull one you should know that going in. Cocktail waitresses on the other hand tend to not be as hardcore alcoholics and don't know the difference between Woodford Reserve and Jack except the price. The good ones often make pretty similar money too 
