Post #779181 by AceExplorer on Fri, Aug 25, 2017 7:14 AM

On 2017-08-25 05:56, tikiskip wrote:
...See that's not true.
...They do make demands...
...cleaning of these tubes...
...if that robot bartender goes down your closed...
...they can cut costs even with these problems, but damn a bar is one place you need that human touch...

Hey skip! Thanks for the feedback on my comments. I was trying to be careful by qualifying my comments with a few things like "stable technology," which meant high reliability. And the whole "show" aspect means you can't just put up a robot - it has to be entertaining as well, and wrapped in a cool environment. And yes, fully agree about the human touch, but the drink making is being automated on an experimental basis whether we like it or not. Dunno if it will work, or if it will last, but that's where good accompanying show design is required. The whole package is a show. But with good engineering and design, and good preventative maintenance, you can get high mean-time-between-failure (MTBF) numbers. This is one of the reasons that there are lots of similar robotic things working quite well in our world, although drink makers are still rare.

So, how about automation (a "robot" of sorts) that MAKES the drinks coupled with bartenders and waitresses? You would be selling the novelty of the process, speedy service, and the owner would get their drinks per hour way higher than one or two or three people behind the stick could do. Service could be surprisingly fast, consistency way good, and the overall customer experience may be superb. So I won't throw any cold water on the idea until they get their concept out there for us to observe and experience. (And then mercilessly critique here, LOL!)

Reminds me... One in our tiki community is a robot/animation engineer in the entertainment world. He doesn't post here, or even log in, but I'd guess he could quote some solid info on how reliable these things are and what it takes to keep 'em running smoothly.

By the way, a "robot" doesn't have to be a Disney or Chuck-E-Cheese automaton. It can simply be a box on the back counter (or two boxes, or three boxes, etc. for redundancy) that makes the drinks. Someone would still have to deliver the drinks to customers even if ordering were to be done by bar-top iPads, iPhone apps, etc. And we're already purging and sanitizing our LONG Perlick runs to the keg reefers, so the same would extend to the cocktail automation.

Slightly different subject --- smart phone apps are gaining more traction. Even old-school tiki bars like the Molokai Bar at the Mai-Kai could eventually start using this sort of technology in the not-too-distant future. I wouldn't be surprised to hear that order accuracy, efficiency improvements with billing, inventory, credit card batch closing, and after-closing accounting -and more- eventually lead our fave tropical themed watering holes to insert more technology between our servers and customers. Sooooo....

....I don't like the idea of robots making drinks, especially in old-school environments like tiki bars. It's just not traditional. I like PEOPLE demonstrating their skill along with the human touch, and some inconsistency comes with it. But there will always be shortcut hunters, and novelty sellers, and automation fits in to this category of people. So that's really what this Nashville place is sounding like. And the manufacturer is probably cutting them a killer deal on the machines cuz they need to get their products into production so they can sell more of them. Whatever. Cuz I can't stop them even if I wanted to.

Imagine a "Back To The Future" themed bar with robot drink makers. That would be more appropriate than in a tiki setting. But if the machines become small and reliable, and make people a lot of money, then it could become much more common.

So have I been talking out of both sides of my mouth? Maybe. But I'm just thinking out loud here, so what the hell, right? :)

Cheers!