Operation Swill

There’s a wonderful John Gorka song that goes “I’m from New Jersey, I don’t expect too much...”

If Operation Swill is any indication, Mr.Gorka knew what he was singing about.

For those who missed the news, a recent Garden State investigation – delightfully code-named Operation Swill – revealed that a whole slew of bars and restaurants throughout the state were substituting well brands for premium brands.

This is, of course, one of those “No shit, Sherlock” situations that makes one ask whether you need a year-long investigation to ferret out something that most of us suspect goes on in plenty of bars, and not just in New Jersey.

All that ordering Stoli or Grey Goose and ending up  with Popov or Smirnoff’s….

But substituting Fleischmann’s for Tanqueray was the least of it.

One bar “allegedly mixed rubbing alcohol with caramel food coloring and served it as scotch”, while another “is accused of pouring dirty water into an empty bottle and passing it off as liquor.” (Source NJ.com.)

Now I’ve heard of watering drinks, but dirty watering a drink?

I don’t think that’s quite what the Standells had in mind when they sang “Love that Dirty Water.”

And that caramel colored rubbing alcohol passed off as Scotch?

Scotch on its own is nasty enough, but caramel colored rubbing alcohol?

I know that restaurants can be a low margin business, but the profit potential on booze, it seems to me, doesn’t have to be artificially enhanced.

First, the markup on even premium brands is pretty darned good.

Assume that a bar pays $20 for a bottle of Stoli – which they don’t: they pay a lot less – and gets 20 drinks out of it, that they charge $10 a pop for.

Do the math. Even when you factor in the cost of the bartender’s time to pour the drink (15 seconds, max), the cost of the glass, washing the glass, serving the patron, presenting the bill, putting through the charge, processing the tip… Pretty much every bottle of liquor or wine has a pretty good ROI.

In the way back, I was a waitress, but I wasn’t aware of any booze watering or swapping out in the places where I worked. That’s not to say it didn’t happen.

This was also, of course, in an era when there was less premium anything. I don’t ever remember anyone requesting a specific vodka, and Coors was considered an upscale, classy beer.

Still, there are always trimmers.

As a diner outer/drinker outer, I have had an occasional Cape Codder (cranberry juice and vodka) that didn’t seem to have much alcohol in it, but those occasions were surely balanced out by the Cape Codder that was so strong it looked pink rather than red.

One time, many years ago, my husband and I were having a drink at the Peacock Alley bar at the Waldorf Astoria, and we observed the waiter knocking back half of each of the shots the bartender had poured for our drinks. I remember we laughed about it, but I don’t know whether we bothered to call him on it. It was just so idiotically brazen, reminding me of the Groucho question, “Who do you believe, me or your own eyes?” Similarly, on the non-booze front, I once watched as a waitress poured me a cup of de-caf coffee from the caf pot. When I told her I’d watched her pour me a cup of caf – the orange-handled pot was empty – she denied it. Again with the Groucho question. I refused the coffee and told her that, if she was going to do something like that, she’d best do it out of the sight line of the person who’d done the ordering…

Back to Operation Swill:

Thirteen of the establishments identified were TGI Fridays franchises operated by the Briad Group, a Livingston-based hospitality company. TGI Friday's corporate offices in Texas said today that the accusations are "very disturbing."

Briad is, of course, shocked, just shocked.

Briad president Rick Barbrick said today that the allegations are "troubling and surprising to us."

"We can assure our loyal and valuable guests that it is our corporate policy to treat all of our patrons honestly and fairly, "Barbrick said in a statement.

I suspect he meant “valued guests”, rather than “valuable guests”, but I may be wrong. After all, a guest that’s willing to pay over ten-bucks for a mixed drink with premium or well liquor is obviously a “valuable guest.”

In any case, the tsk-tsk behavior is certainly not in keeping with the Briad “brand promise.”

Welcome to fun.

If you can eat there, drink there or sleep there, we can play with it, adding our special brand of flare to the flavor of fun we like to call The Briad Group. Welcome to our website, where you’ll learn about one of America’s fastest growing hospitality companies.

That’s some “special brand of flare” they’ve got going there, that’s for sure.

"This is essentially a wake-up call to the less altruistic operators in the industry that they need to get their act together," [Michael] Halfacre [Director, NJ Division of Alcoholic Beverage Control] said. (Source: back to NJ.com.)

Congratulations, Mr. Halfacre. This is perhaps the first time the the word “altruistic” has been associated with the food and beverage industry.

Personally, I think it’s nice if a restaurant wants to collect quarters for the Special Olympics. Or give away pies at Thanksgiving. And I love that Panera has set up some Panera Cares restaurants, where they suggest a price, but where everybody doesn’t pay the price. The haves subsidize the have-nots (and the selfish jerks who take advantage of a nice, bleeding heart endeavor). Note to self: have lunch – and overpay – at Panera Cares this week.

But I don’t really expect any business to operate in altruistic mode.

I do expect them to be honest with respect to the goods and services they offer, and not to serve me wares that are adulterated. If I want a dirty-water-and-cranberry rather than a Cape Codder, I’ll order one, thank you.

As for the restaurants that Operation Swill nailed, I bet that more than a few of them are going to be saying C-ya to those liquor licenses. Not to mention the “valuable guests” who won’t be heading back any time soon.

Serves them – the restaurants, not the “valuable guests”, right.