Isn’t really shocking I guess.


https://vitalvegas.com/mgm-resorts-t...u6efhyvJAcIv5Y

Very cool actually. I wonder when will this happen.

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This will slow down drink service dramatically. Perhaps that's the point.

One human bartender is much more efficient than one robot bartender, which can only spit out one drink at a time and has to have someone inputting those orders, which ties up the machine in the meantime (because in any other POS system, orders are being input WHILE the bartender is making someone's else's drinks). Unless there's a bank of these at each service well, it's gonna get slow.

Patrons having to ice their own glass and garnish their own drinks is a deal-breaker. Do you have any idea how many jamokes I see leaving the bathroom without washing their hands on the reg?

It's not a self-serve bartender for patrons, it's for cocktail servers. They're the ones doing the ice and garnish.

MGM will save 500k/yr from this one ml of cheap vodka at a time

Each machine will have Jon Taffer's huge mug prominently plastered all over it, with the slogan "No More Long Pours".

If MGM were serious about increasing marginal revenue, it would get Nevada to allow pre-packaged dispensary sales on the casino floor or give away those edibles the way it currently offers alcohol at the gaming tables and banks of machines.

Minimum wager required for free edibles.... maybe loyalty points redemption also.

No "bartender" needed for service dispensary, which could be off the floor entirely. Much less labor intensive way to ply your patrons.

Good they have one less customer now. Corporate bums.

if it makes you feel better, the people these machines are replacing are not even bartenders most of the time. they might not even be replacing anyone.

at a lot of casinos, for basic mixed drinks the waitresses themselves are pouring the drinks. there's not like a bartender standing in the bowels of the mirage waiting for cocktail waitresses to drop off orders.

if i were a betting man (and I am) i'd place a wager that not only does robo-tender save money on alcohol, but the cocktail waitresses will like it.

by the way, this sort of thing is why vegas continues to thrive and live on.

las vegas, perhaps better than any other city, is great at evolving.

this is just phase one. the days of human card dealers are numbered. the article says the unions are digging their heels in regarding automation. luckily for las vegas, the casinos are not interested in employing people in useless jobs - they want to make money.

in 30 years, the job "blackjack dealer" simply will not exist. the El Cortez will have a novelty blackjack dealer. she will be hot. there will be no comped drinks. but don't worry.

by that time, the oppressive communist government will require the las vegas casinos to hire men and women in a 1:1 ratio for all jobs. so there will be hundreds of shirtless men working as cocktail waiters - if the blackjack dealers lose some weight, they could scoop up some of those jobs!

actually most of the time there is a bartender in a little room surrounded by bottles in what is essentially a closet....cocktail walks in and tells the service bartender the orders ....the service bartender makes the drinks

the service bartenders are lowest on the totem pole in seniority in the hotel (waitresses barely tip them out but they say you have to start somewhere) but they put their time in on those shifts to move up and get a better shift bid to the packed bars on the floor on busy nights....

so yes they will replace people....they are in the 'bowels'.....and the cocktail waitresses will hate it....trust me they would surely trade the tiny amount they tip out to service bartenders to not have to deal with making drinks too.... even if it is by machine

does that guy really count as a bartender? isn't it more like the job you get in order to become a bartender? i'm not trying to hate, i'm just saying there's a difference between a guy working the back bar at a restaraunt and the closet drink guy.

the girls are def already making their own drinks at some of the slower places!

In the casino of life the service bartenders are the rake

you are a barback before you graduate to bartender....

the service bartender's job title is 'union bartender'

the only difference between the service bartender and the bartender who gets the great shifts at the busiest joint in the casino is seniority..they get the same wage, pension, benefits, etc. (obviously tips differ huge from placement)

higher seniority bids on the better shifts...people just starting out usually all that's left is service...

cocktail will help with garnishes and straws after service pours the drinks... but no way would they want to stand at a machine pushing buttons to fill drinks while they could use that time to be out on the floor getting more orders....

people will lose jobs/hiring will slow down/ and you getting your drink will take longer...and your waitress will be miserable.....caesars will follow suit soon after....welcome to the new vegas...in a decade or two there wont be a human working in these places...... but the stock prices will be at an all time high!

I'm all for it if I don't have to tip the robot bartender. Then I just need a robot to bring me beers at the poker table.

Paradise Poker used to serve you a drink online at your table while you played.

(Coincidentally, there is a new thread by that name in Poker Challenges, https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1...poker-1737200/ )

Your drink would appear at the click of a mouse.

You could also get a cigar.

That was automation replacing bartenders, along with dealers and an entire hotel of labor costs, yet generating gaming revenue.

Per the linked article:

(Actually, the way seniority works, service bartenders are pretty far up the food chain, bartenderwise. So, as they get displaced, they’ll bump others from their positions, and so on, down the line.)


I'm not saying you're wrong because I don't know, but what Vital Vegas is saying is the opposite of what you're saying. Can you elaborate?

I'll elaborate as a union bartender (luckily not at MGM properties anymore).

Augie has is completely wrong. Like couldn't be more wrong bc he acted like he knew what he was talking about.

The service wells are controlled chaos. I don't think people realize how many drinks are going out to the tables and slots. So the main service well (we have 5 total, not counting the pool) on a swing shift will have two bartenders, someone that comes through to work during the breaks, and a barback. There will be about 15 waitresses coming in and out, grabbing their glasses and icing them, and order between 1-10 drinks at a time. The bartenders will be making drinks 85% of their time and the other 15% of the time help the barbacks catch up on restocking beer, liquor, juices, water, and clearing the conveyor belt style dishwasher if it starts to back up from the dishes not getting stacked back on racks quick enough (because he is constantly replacing things the entire time also). Oh I forgot to add we actually have a terminal where we have to punch in what the waitresses are leaving with for accounting purposes.

As far as seniority, it depends on how busy the service well is. There will be multiple in a casino, some busy, some not so much. This depends on the shift as well.

In my casino, the main service well day shift bartender has been with the company 26 years. The two swing shift bartenders are also decently high up in seniority. The graveyard bartender, not too long. All these shifts are good money besides the graveyard shift. They aren't the best money shifts in the casino, but it's pretty good money and little risk of getting fired (bc you don't deal with customers or money), so people with high seniority take them.

The other service wells are less busy but don't have a barback, and the bartenders do the glassware bc it sits behind the bar. They have far less waitresses so the money in less but most are still decent.

I'm going to continue in another post

couldn't be more wrong about what?

sorry, i don't think they will have waitresses lined up behind these jack & coke dispensers while all hell is breaking loose. they aren't that stupid.

they are not going to replace actual bartenders with these. if these replace people, they will be bartenders that are not firing off 10 drink orders one after another.

they will be the bartender that apparently is standing in the bowels of the mirage with nothing to do while 50 yr old Sally McVodka mulls around with her empty tray.

Let's say this gets implemented. First off it's going to be a ****show. Secondly I don't see how all of our wells wouldn't have to be completely redesigned (the beer coolers are behind the only place you can put the machines.

Third, the pace guests will receive drinks will crawl to a standstill. It will become a literal traffic jam. Waitresses would hate this. I can't even guess how much money they would lose.

The only way this could work is if the casino stopped giving away comped drinks and people just stopped drinking for the most part when they gambled.

I have mixed feelings about vital vegas. Obviously he gets scoops but he tends to act like an expert bc someone told him something. He wrote an article once that all casinos on the strip sub out cheap liquor (in fact don't even stock it) in the service wells. I sent him a DM video of our main service well showing him everything we had, how much of it we had for one days service, and what we poured. I asked him if he was going to post a retraction and he said no because all the other casinos do it. I told him I've worked for multiple casinos, both MGM prop, Caesars prop, and Fremont street and what he was claiming wasn't the case and then he ignored me.

He also tweeted a bull**** claim about how much we made an hour before tips, which was way higher than we do and doubled down on it saying a casino executive told him when multiple people tried to correct him.

everything

the fact that you think a service well bartender makes less drinks than a "real bartender" shows you have no clue. It's basically an assembly line a lot of the time.

The only thing that slows it down is how hard the waitresses are willing to work. If you think Sally McVodka is lazy now, wait until she has to find her glasses to read the machines.

behind door #2, the robo-tender perfectly compliments the bartender and everyone is more happy because a machine is doing some of your work.

behind door #3, the robo-tender is faster, more accurate, and complains a lot less than union bartenders, and the guests and waitresses win while the union bartenders are now free to pursue their lifelong dreams of becoming an artist.

i've served plenty of drinks and there are a million times when i'd have strangled a kitten to be able to press a button and quickly receive the drink i'm waiting for.

i didn't say a service bartender makes fewer drinks than a "real bartender"

i said these machines won't replace "real bartenders"

i mean this with complete sincerity. this applies to every job under the sun.

if you get replaced by a machine, that is the universe doing you a favor. who wants to be a machine all day?