Free-pour variance

When a bartender pours free-hand instead of using a jigger or a measured pourer, small errors add up. A build that calls for 40 ml of gin but lands at 45 or 50 ml every time looks generous to the guest, but it quietly rewrites your cost per drink and your inventory. Bar inventory studies commonly put this over-pour in the 10 to 20% range.

The damage is invisible night to night and only surfaces at the monthly count, when actual beverage cost comes in well above theoretical. A bar pouring 15% heavy on spirits can turn a healthy 20% pour cost into 23% or worse, and on a thin net margin that gap is a large share of the profit on every spirit sold.

You do not have to ban free-pouring, but you do have to measure the drift. Compare theoretical usage from your spec sheets against counted inventory, spot the categories running heavy, and retrain or switch to measured pourers where the variance is worst. What you cannot measure, you cannot control.