Since its rise in the post-prohibition era of the early 1930s, the alcoholic beverages market has continually evolved with respect to its clientele and technological advancements. Over the last decade, bar and restaurant owners have employed the rising technology trends to mitigate their most pressing issues and enhance the overall efficiency of their operation. Currently, one of the most prevalent challenges faced by a majority of bar owners revolves around loss prevention (spillage, theft, over-pouring) of beverages. This problem is compounded by the lack of an efficient and quick way to manage the inventory of beers and spirits. Today, despite having the need to check their stock of spirits and beer at shorter intervals with maximum accuracy, most bars still uses conventional inventory management systems that are not only slow and inefficient but also negatively impacts the bottom-line. “With potential losses of up to 20 percent being related to faulty inventory management, bars are set to lose revenue equivalent to their stock buying price,” says John Fazari, CEO at Barventory. To develop a solution that can help bar owners mitigate the losses caused by inefficient or slow inventory management, Fazari along with his partners, founded Barventory in 2018. The company provides a portfolio of proprietary hardware and software offerings that allows bar owners to improve inventory management, thereby driving cost savings and overall business growth.

Simplifying Alcohol Inventory Management

To help bars transition their legacy inventory management system into a digital experience, Barventory has developed two main products, namely its Keg Scale and Bar Top Scale. As the names suggest, the keg scale is designed to accurately record the volumes of beer that is stored in a bar’s kegs, and the Bar Top Scale enables users to identify brands, track the weight of bottles, and place orders for spirit bottles.

Both these hardware offerings are connected via Barventory’s software application that allows bar owners to create data-driven inventory management processes. The software has two core modules that allow users to minimize staff-related and inventory-related losses. Barventory’s staff-centered module gathers information regarding the staff, including their work shifts. The inventory-centric module, on the other hand, records the start and end of shift volumes of spirits and beer. The software also gives insight into employees’ performance, which the bar owners can assess to ensure that no losses are minimized by their establishment’s workforce. Moreover, the software’s algorithms exclude unimportant data and only focus on information that can help bar owners losses and enable them in addressing the prevalent issues in their operations as quickly as possible. “Our portfolio allows a bar owner to effectively protect, manage, and review all of their stock and inventory at anytime and anywhere,” adds Michael Peters, chief development officer of Barventory. Concurrently, the company’s easy-to-use sliding module aids bar owners to track their stock, run inventory math, and prepare reorder requirement lists. The users can also manage sale-related cash-flows in real-time, which directly impact the overall performance of the establishment.

Delivering Real Value to Bar Owners

Discussing the core competencies of Barventory’s portfolio, George Bortolato,Director of Sales at Barventory, elaborates, “The Barventory products add tremendous value as they improve the yield on what is purchased by reducing the waste, and aids clients in managing employee performance.” He also mentions the significant long-term impacts of using Barventory’s system as the system’s impenetrable protection of stock minimizes opportunities for theft and drives behavioural changes in employees. Apart from such unmatched capabilities, Peters emphasizes on how his company’s offerings are unlike any other inventory management system as it is specifically designed for the management of liquor and beer stock. “Most inventory management systems available today have to be integrated with a bar’s existing POS system to link the frontend and backend processes.

However, our system is built to run independently without the need for extensive programming,” remarks Peters. At the same time, the company’s portfolio is highly flexible and scalable as it allows clients to connect its software to their existing inventory management products alongside the keg scale and bar top scales. And according to Fazari, the software has the scalability to enable bar owners to manage beer and spirit inventory at up to 50 bars from a single screen and interface.

A Future of Promise and Collaboration

Currently, Barventory is strengthening its marketing and sales strategies, to effectively bring new products with unparalleled capabilities to the market once the COVID-19 pandemic becomes a thing of the past. Barventory has proven that alcohol inventory does not have to be a slow and cumbersome process, and can be performed quickly, more accurately, and with only one person per shift. And in today’s coronavirus environment, minimal working staff drives support the worldwide social distancing guidelines.

Under its in-development list are the Barventory site recipe list, which will aid bar owners calculate how much alcohol should be sold on a per drink basis and allow them to run comparisons with the actual volumes. Also on the horizon is a POS system that will calculate the value of wholesale and retail beverages sold. The company is also diligently working to build a strong post-implementation support infrastructure to help its clients make the most of their investment. Looking ahead, Barventory will continue helping bar owners minimize their losses and improve profitability in today’s very low-margin market ecosystem. “We are excited to aid bar owners and creating long-term sustainable partnerships through our portfolio, and expand our footprint in the EU,” concludes Fazari.