Why do hotel bars close early?

Andrew Broughton

Andrew Broughton

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Feb 2, 2011
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So, I've asked the hotels and done a little searching on the interweb, but as yet I haven't discovered a definitive answer as to why lobby bars in hotels close at 10:00pm or 11:00pm when the local bars close at 2:00am or later.

When the bar has customers, why wouldn't the hotel want to make the easy money that comes from serving longer?

The reasons I've heard range from the staff not wanting to work late to the noise of the bar disturbing the sleeping guests, but nothing explains this almost universal policy of closing early.

It's quite annoying after getting back from load out at 11:00pm only to find the bar closed, but I'm more curious as to the "real" reason for this policy.

Anyone researched this or have the inside scoop?
 
Re: Why do hotel bars close early?

Bennett Prescott said:
It's definitely to keep out the riff raff. You may not want to go to bed at 11, but most of their regular customers do so they'd be keeping the bar open for a bunch of rowdy drunks.
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That and they don't want to put on another whole shift for a few hours work.

I learned early on when offered my choice of comped rooms to take the cheap motel rather than the downtown hotel with a pool. With the pool, the parents will let their kids run the halls from the room to the pool until they're done at the bar. Worst of both worlds since comped rooms are inevitably the ones next to the elevator.

Much easier to sleep at a two-story motel next to the main highway with no pool. You'll also be closer to the all-nite diner so you can get a good hot breakfast when you get up at 5:30 to start your day.
 
Bennett Prescott said:
It's definitely to keep out the riff raff. You may not want to go to bed at 11, but most of their regular customers do so they'd be keeping the bar open for a bunch of rowdy drunks.
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That's what I thought as well, but it doesn't really relate to the real world. In many instances the bar is far away from the rooms and if there's no music then the bar would be relatively quiet and they wouldn't be disturbing. Besides, I can hear people's room parties and TV sets and have never heard a bar unless its a dance club, which is rare in North America. I can see your point in some cases, but I can't in others.
 
Re: Why do hotel bars close early?

Hmmm... Never thought about it before but the person or two working is probably more interested in going home rather than caring how much money the bar makes. There could even be some type of policy allowing the person(s) on duty to stay open longer if the bar is generating money. But....
A: The person there would have to care more about an extra hour's pay and seeing the bar's receipts expand as opposed to going home
and
B: The GM would have to know that the person is closing down a bar that is still generating money.

But by closing time I imagine the GM is long gone... or at least finished paying attention to the hotel (barring an emergency).
 
Re: Why do hotel bars close early?

If they were concerned about it they could look back at the register records and see when transactions start slowing down... I used to live next door to a bar that I "closed" every night from the customer side of the counter... On weeknights the bartenders were allowed to use their discretion to close the bar any time after 9pm (county law had last call at 2am) if things were slow - in fact the owner would look at the register records and yell at the bartenders if he didn't feel the number of transactions warranted keeping the bar open after a certain time... If things were starting to slow down and the bartender wasn't ready to close up yet (and lose an hour of pay, for example) I would occasionally purchase a couple extra bar chips over the course of an hour or so to use the next day (they rang up just like a normal drink so indestinguishable on the records) in addition to my normal drinks to help the bartender make it look as though the bar were busier. (I was pretty good friends with a couple of them...)

Not sure what the point of that narrative was, other than to demonstrate that it does happen elsewhere too - the number of drinks bought has to support the bartender being there those extra hours while at the same time keeping out the riff-raff (part of this is solved by only allowing hotel guests to patronize the bar, but that also depends on who the guests are any given night, sometimes the best way to force them to a different bar is just to close early. The bar I went to was known for being a shot in the dark as to whether it was open late on weeknights which typically kept the not-so-desireable loud obnoxious clientele going to other bars in the area... The owner wasn't concerned about losing their money, more concerned with keeping the regulars)
 
Re: Why do hotel bars close early?

Andrew Broughton said:
That would usually be just one person, and they could make some decent tip money. Still seems odd.
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Bartender.
Security.
Cleanup.

Of course, at some places that might be just one person. When I worked as a night auditor at such an establishment, I was the cleanup.
 
Re: Why do hotel bars close early?

The Marriott had this very informative explanation for why they close early. I'm so glad they took the time to clear this question up.

Dear Andrew Broughton: Thank you for your additional message and for sharing your thoughts regarding time the bar closes with us. We value the opinions and suggestions of all guests and will share your thoughts with the appropriate department within Marriott. Many factors, including customer suggestions, influence enhancements to the services Marriott employees provide our guests. Your patronage is very important to us. We look forward to serving your future lodging needs. Thank you for choosing Marriott. Regards, Megan Glover Marriott Customer Care
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Re: Why do hotel bars close early?

Andrew Broughton said:
The Marriott had this very informative explanation for why they close early. I'm so glad they took the time to clear this question up.
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There you go... :=)

While I've found more than few hotel bars that stayed open later than was in my best interest, in the spirit of your thread I have an anecdote to share about closing down hotel bars.

Years ago I was working the Musik Messe trade show and we were staying at a modest hotel several klicks outside Frankfurt. It was a friend of mine's (Paul V) birthday. He worked for the Dutch Peavey distributors and was staying in the same hotel, so I decided to help him celebrate his birth anniversary properly. :-) The hotel had a small bar in the lobby, and a larger more serious bar downstairs. On our way in, just back from the show booth, we hit the lobby bar for a couple quick biers to wet our whistle. Then we changed out of our booth garb, and headed for Frankfurt to drink them out of beer... We didn't completely succeed, but put a decent dent in the local supply... We staggered back into the hotel hours later and first went downstairs to check out the main bar... The lights were up and they were closed, so we headed back up to the lobby to try for a last call there... The bartender saw us coming and pulled down the metal gate that seals off his bar from the lobby and tried to shoo us off.. "Nine nine nine, closed no drinks". I tried to plead with him but then he started ranting about how he has been working there for 12 hours that day and in all that time only got one tip for 2 DM. I was ready to give up until I remembered that I was the one who gave him that tip hours earlier on my way in from the show.. I reminded him that it was me who gave him the tip, and scored a free round from the now grateful bartender who was our new best friend. :-)

That wasn't, instant Karma but reasonably short payback. So remember to ALWAYS tip your waitstaff... :-)

JR

PS: A bad thing about running a tab in small hotel bars, is they chase your down at breakfast the next morning to settle the bar tabs from the night before... :-( I almost started an international incident in that bar one night when I took away some Brits acoustic guitar and hid it, to stop the racket... I was applauded by most of the bar crowd, but a few of my limey associates were not amused. (I didn't trash the guitar, just hid it in a coat locker, and gave it back the next day.) After near 10 hours on the messe floor I didn't need to hear that...
 
Re: Why do hotel bars close early?

Alan Hamilton said:
Hmmm... Never thought about it before but the person or two working is probably more interested in going home rather than caring how much money the bar makes. There could even be some type of policy allowing the person(s) on duty to stay open longer if the bar is generating money. But....
A: The person there would have to care more about an extra hour's pay and seeing the bar's receipts expand as opposed to going home
and
B: The GM would have to know that the person is closing down a bar that is still generating money.

But by closing time I imagine the GM is long gone... or at least finished paying attention to the hotel (barring an emergency).
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I'll agree.

I suspect satiety/ complacency with the day’s take generally happens earlier in the day at a hotel than a nightclub.

It also seems to me (as you alluded to) that hotel GM's are generally "game on" between approx. 6:00am and 4:00pm, where-as club owners are generally "game on" somewhere on the order of mid-afternoon to closing time (I've seldom seen a hotel GM on site to ring out the till and pay the band at 2:00am, and I've seldom had a club owner take my call to deal with a situation (equating to a reservation) at 7:00am.
 
Re: Why do hotel bars close early?

I've always felt that lobby bars were a total ripoff and would rather hang out in the room with a box of whatever cans you can acquire at a liquor store between hotel and gig.
Lousy pours, non-attentive service, no-personality bartenders and extremely overpriced are what I've found to be the average at the "higher-end" hotel lobby bars.

I've found bribing night houskeeping staff to run and get you a case from the local 'mart works quite good -if you're stuck without car in downtown cores that roll-up the sidewalks at night. (or those city downtown areas where you simply don't want to be outside of the safety of your hotel after dark :-) like carrying 2 bottles of Jack from Greektown back to your Holiday Inn Express in downtown Detroit after midnight sometime.
 
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