Gulf Coast Bands Music Forum - View Single Post

Trey · 05-24-2007, 04:29 PM

Hate to bring up an old thread, but I don't think TG will even be having any more decent bands play. I worked there for a few months, and I'm surprised I put up with it as long as I did. The owner, Mike, is super tight about everything and super controlling. As stated before, the drink prices there are pretty high, and he always tries to lowball anyone who he wants to perform there. He had never been in the bar business before opening this place up, and his lack of knowledge and experience shows.

I used to try to help him out because a lot of things were so out of whack, but he always took it the wrong way, like I was trying to tell him how to run his business. Drink prices were all over the place, he didn't know what the charge people, and on top of that he tried to squeeze every penny out of the customers. I'll never forget the time he wanted me to charge a guy $23 for an Incredible Hulk. Just to give you an idea of how clueless it was there, a Baybreeze was $5, and a Seabreeze was $6. When I tried to explain to him that it was almost the exact same drink and the prices should be the same, it just turned into another arguement. One time I asked him if we have any more so&so beer left in the cooler, and his response was "you don't get everything you want!" I'm like WTF????

As if this wasn't enough, he treated me and other employees like shit. He didn't trust me at all. He and his wife always watched me like a hawk. Seems like every other minute, they'd be over my shoulder to make sure I wasn't somehow stealing from them. Whenever I ran tabs for people, they'd constantly be checking the tabs behind the bar to see what I wrote down, asking me why I charged them this, why that, all while I'm trying to make a line of 6 other drinks. Not to mention him being behind the bar all the time just getting in the way in general. I'd be serving customers, exchanging money, etc, and he'd be in my ear, "make me a walk me down, make me a red snapper, what's in a Malibu pineapple? (no joke)." It was the most frustrating thing, I wanted to just yell at him, "quit talking to customers!!!" He used to tell me not to throw bottlecaps on the floor behind the bar because he didn't want someone to fall and hit their head on a bottlecap. Some of the stuff was insane.

No matter how busy we got, he wouldn't let me bring in a barback or hire one. While we were discussing this, he would tell me that if I needed anything, just tell him and he'd get it, so we don't need a barback. So when we started getting real busy, I'd tell him, I need more Bud Light, need a bottle of this, need those glasses washed, more ice, etc, etc, he'd sometimes give me the comments "you get it, I don't work for you" or "don't tell me what to do." It was a circle of crazy frustration.

I quit about a week before he kicked Mandown off the stage, when I heard about it, I wasn't surprised at all. When I finally decided I'd had enough, I put in my 2 weeks notice, and he fired me that night. About a month later while I was in there at a show (I think Absence of Concern/Vysion) he asked me to come back, I thought that funny. Its a shame though because he had a good thing going, he started building a good customer base pretty quickly. And a few of the people who help him run the place, like his stepkids Ian and Heather are good people who understood where I was usually coming from, but even they couldn't get through to him.

05-24-2007, 04:29 PM	#34 (permalink)
Trey Screamo for Emo Join Date: May 2007 Location: Biloxi Age: 29 Posts: 167 Rep Power: 14	Hate to bring up an old thread, but I don't think TG will even be having any more decent bands play. I worked there for a few months, and I'm surprised I put up with it as long as I did. The owner, Mike, is super tight about everything and super controlling. As stated before, the drink prices there are pretty high, and he always tries to lowball anyone who he wants to perform there. He had never been in the bar business before opening this place up, and his lack of knowledge and experience shows. I used to try to help him out because a lot of things were so out of whack, but he always took it the wrong way, like I was trying to tell him how to run his business. Drink prices were all over the place, he didn't know what the charge people, and on top of that he tried to squeeze every penny out of the customers. I'll never forget the time he wanted me to charge a guy $23 for an Incredible Hulk. Just to give you an idea of how clueless it was there, a Baybreeze was $5, and a Seabreeze was $6. When I tried to explain to him that it was almost the exact same drink and the prices should be the same, it just turned into another arguement. One time I asked him if we have any more so&so beer left in the cooler, and his response was "you don't get everything you want!" I'm like WTF???? As if this wasn't enough, he treated me and other employees like shit. He didn't trust me at all. He and his wife always watched me like a hawk. Seems like every other minute, they'd be over my shoulder to make sure I wasn't somehow stealing from them. Whenever I ran tabs for people, they'd constantly be checking the tabs behind the bar to see what I wrote down, asking me why I charged them this, why that, all while I'm trying to make a line of 6 other drinks. Not to mention him being behind the bar all the time just getting in the way in general. I'd be serving customers, exchanging money, etc, and he'd be in my ear, "make me a walk me down, make me a red snapper, what's in a Malibu pineapple? (no joke)." It was the most frustrating thing, I wanted to just yell at him, "quit talking to customers!!!" He used to tell me not to throw bottlecaps on the floor behind the bar because he didn't want someone to fall and hit their head on a bottlecap. Some of the stuff was insane. No matter how busy we got, he wouldn't let me bring in a barback or hire one. While we were discussing this, he would tell me that if I needed anything, just tell him and he'd get it, so we don't need a barback. So when we started getting real busy, I'd tell him, I need more Bud Light, need a bottle of this, need those glasses washed, more ice, etc, etc, he'd sometimes give me the comments "you get it, I don't work for you" or "don't tell me what to do." It was a circle of crazy frustration. I quit about a week before he kicked Mandown off the stage, when I heard about it, I wasn't surprised at all. When I finally decided I'd had enough, I put in my 2 weeks notice, and he fired me that night. About a month later while I was in there at a show (I think Absence of Concern/Vysion) he asked me to come back, I thought that funny. Its a shame though because he had a good thing going, he started building a good customer base pretty quickly. And a few of the people who help him run the place, like his stepkids Ian and Heather are good people who understood where I was usually coming from, but even they couldn't get through to him. __________________ Ninjas kill pirates. The end. Last edited by Trey; 05-24-2007 at 04:31 PM.