How many bar staff do you need?

The baseline ratios

What moves the numbers

• Menu complexity. Batched serves run at roughly 40–50 drinks per bartender per hour. Shaken, made-to-order cocktails run closer to 25–30.
• Arrival pattern. A hundred guests arriving over an hour is a different job from a hundred arriving in fifteen minutes. Press events and launches need tray service through the door.
• Room layout. Split floors, gardens and terraces create separate queues. Two service points usually beat one bigger bar.
• Food. A seated dinner shifts work from the bar to table service, so the mix changes — fewer bartenders, more waiting staff.

The barback is the cheap upgrade

When a bar slows down, it is rarely because the bartenders are slow. It is because they are fetching ice, hunting for clean glasses or clearing the bar top. A barback costs less than a bartender and returns more capacity at 60 guests and above.

When to add a bar manager

Above roughly 100 guests, or whenever there are two service points, someone needs to own the timings, the stock and the decisions — otherwise those questions come to the host mid-event. That is the whole argument for a bar manager: you get your own party back.