Is Working in a Bar Better Than Corporate America?

Let me preface this blog by saying I cut my teeth for many years in the bar/restaurant industry and I've earned my stripes both in the kitchen and pouring drinks. And despite having to work nights and weekends, there will always be a lore with going back to that industry. 

There is something inherently special of the fast-paced, long-hour shifts that come associated with being in that environment. And while I sit in my home office with a lucky-to-have corporate job, the grass still looks and smells greener of going back into that life. 

There are a few main reasons why we all put up with corporate America jobs.... and not a single one has to do with lining the shareholders pockets while they squeeze us and our clients for every single cent. If we look through the eyes of the bartender, a typical 9-5 can seem glamorous, depending on what you're into. 

This includes no late nights, no standing on your feet for 12 hour shifts, the ability to enjoy a social life or watch your favorite sports teams (live!). As I start to list the reasons it actually makes perfect sense why most people put up with it. Not to include health insurance and god forbid if you have a kids, then working nights/weekends can make your life extremely difficult. 

But as the new generation enters into the working class of America, it's seemingly becoming quicker to snuff out the bullshit of this life and not want any part of it. I am not sure what the future brings with the rise of AI, but when it comes to a typical corporate job, there's a lot of bullshit that people endure, and we exist in a modern-age clash against the old thinking heads that have already devoted their entire life to this fake existence. 

Meetings meetings meetings. More meetings after those meetings and in turn you find out that they eventually accomplish nothing whatsoever. They are the backbone of a pseudo-productive working environment, when almost everything could be settled with a simple email. Next is the true illusion you must provide of getting actual work done. 

The reason most c-suite and management employees want you back in the office is because the feel slighted, as if they never got to fully experience that remote working is perfectly fine. They want your ass in that chair until 5pm and if you want to leave a minute sooner, you aren't working hard enough. You could be playing scrabble online from the hours 2pm-5pm but as long as you're visible to leadership, you're the hardest worker they've seen. Play an extra round of scrabble and stay til 5:30? You're due for a raise. 

This type of fake bullshit is what's driving the younger generation bonkers and allowing folks to see the forest through the trees on the fact that what we're doing is actually entirely bullshit. Back to my original point of working in a bar...

In my salad days, I found my way pouring drinks at a Buffalo Wild Wings for about a year. It was some of the most fun I had, and I was making a substantial living, collecting $300 in tips 5x/week plus my paycheck money which roughly estimated out to another $400/week.  That's just under $8K/month if you do the math, and that's at a simple franchise shop in the suburbs. Imagine working at a higher-class restaurant or somewhere that actually generates volume. 

In most cases, I think it's fair to say that the pay is actually better than a lot of corporate jobs today. I'll never forget what a regular once told me at that BWW. "Mitch, you have the best job there is. You get to hang out in a bar for 8 straight hours, but instead of spending all your money and getting blasted, you're making money. You still get to have the barstool conversations and leave at the end of it with the ability to get your car home and a wad of cash in your pocket". 

That comment has always stuck with me as it was true. Personally, I love spending my days hanging out in bars, watching a full slate of college football games on a Saturday, bouncing around with no plan whatsoever. Behind the bar, I got to do exactly that -- while MAKING money (minus the money I would lose on the sports bets I placed, which was happening either way). 

I also bartended during my time at Minnesota State many years ago. You want to talk about the best job as a college student, there ya go. What a fucking blast that was. I could write 100 blogs with stories from those days.

So I write this blog knowing that the window of opportunity for me to re-enter the restaurant industry has far been closed, but it's hard not to conceptualize that those moments busting ass, drinking on the job, ripping cigs with the servers by dumpsters, and not being filtered by some HR department are things that many take for granted. And if you want my answer, working in a bar is significantly better than working in corporate America.