Kennedy News and MediaAs someone who used to work in a bar, I can confirm there’s nothing worse than people forgetting their manners the minute they’ve had drink.
That’s why it comes as no surprise that a London bar is so sick of rude customers, it has taken a drastic stance to demand some respect.
And how do you demand the respect of a rowdy drunken rabble? Well, you erect a prominent sign warning punters to ‘SAY PLEASE, YOU C*NTS!’, of course.
General manager Lewis Farrell of Bacchus Late Bar in Kingston upon Thames, London, said they had experienced a lot of ‘quite rude and aggressive’ customers thanks to ‘alcohol being in the mix’. No surprise there.
Kennedy News and MediaAlthough the general rule of working in the service industry is ‘the customer is always right’, the 27-year-old asked ‘where do you draw the line?’ when looking after staff.
The sign, chalked up in capitals on a black board with the word ‘please’ underlined, now stands proudly and in full view of the bar seven nights a week.
Lewis, from Kingston upon Thames, London, said:
[Rude customers] come part in parcel with hospitality.
I’ve worked in many bars and near enough every nightclub in this town at one point or another and it’s always the same thing.
You just get people who are abrupt. Even when I’ve been doing restaurant management or hotel work you’d be like ‘good afternoon, sir, how’s your day?’ and they’d just be like ‘rum and coke’.
In the industry we all share the same frustrations with that sort of thing. This is a way to highlight that I guess.
Kennedy News and MediaIncredibly, Lewis claims the x-rated sign has worked, insisting people actually are being more polite when ordering drinks when they have it up. It’s a miracle!
Punters visiting the bar have even shared photos of the sign on social media, where it has mostly been praised as something that is ‘much needed in this day and age’.
Lewis continued:
I definitely think it’s worked. We get a lot of really positive reactions to it. A lot of people take photos of it or point it out and people can have a bit of a laugh with it.
What I’ve noticed particularly with nightclubs is you do get a lot of people who are quite rude, quite aggressive – this is what happens when alcohol gets added into the mix.
There’s the whole ethos of ‘the customer is always right’, which I do believe is a very important cornerstone of the hospitality business
But at the time same, where do you draw the line with actually looking after your own staff?
Kennedy News and MediaThe staff at Bacchus Late Bar, which has been open for nearly 30 years, are a long standing small group who are ‘like a family’.
Lewis said a lot of other bartenders and restaurant workers who come to the independent venue say they wish they could follow in its footsteps in their own bars – but he said this is a lot harder in chains.
Lewis, who has worked in hospitality since he was 18, said:
We’re proud to have a team that looks out for each other both inside work and outside of it.
It would be much nicer if everyone looked after their staff at the baseline level. Some people don’t appreciate that it can be a very hard job. You’ve got a lot of very unsocial hours and back-to-back shifts.
People are frustrated. You can never know what kind of day someone is having and a client’s words can make a world of difference.
Some of our staff have [started working here] not feeling very confident and this place has helped them come out of their shell, myself included.
Hospitality can be a very vicious industry but if you all look out for one another then I do believe you can be in it for the long haul.
Lewis said the sign has even become a bit of a conversation piece, adding that they’ve had multiple signs which say things like ‘be kind to your staff – we remember our first beer too’. Another one says ‘please don’t make the staff cry, it reduces productivity’.
Kennedy News and MediaThe manager continued:
We’re a bit tongue in cheek. We have a laugh with ourselves and a lot of our regular customers also appreciate it. I think it kind of humanises us in a way.
Last week, a picture of the sign was put on Facebook with the caption, ‘no caption needed’, and it racked up loads of support from social media users who hailed it ‘much needed in this day and age’.
Another person commented, ‘I think staff should be able to call c*nts as they are and set fire to rude demanding f*ckers.’
A third wrote:
A bar with a sign like that deserves good business. See you Saturday.
Well, it’s not just there for decoration guys. Play nice.
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Emma Rosemurgey is an NCTJ trained Journalist who started her career by producing The Royal Rosemurgey newspaper in 2004, which kept her family up to date with the goings on of her sleepy north east village. She graduated from the University of Central Lancashire in Preston and started her career in regional newspapers before joining Tyla (formerly Pretty 52) in 2017, and progressing onto UNILAD in 2019.