Just One More Drink
Bar culture in the UK encourages binge drinking. It’s even more challenging if you’re the one pouring the drinks.
The United Kingdom has always been known to have pubs on every corner that help Britons to socialize and unwind with a nice refreshing beer after work. Alcohol in the UK has long been a part of the culture, but this has turned into an addiction for some.
As you enter the bar, you can feel the bass from the music pulsating through the speakers, along with the loud, slurred, and sometimes vulgar conversations of people around you. Shelves and shelves of liquor and a whole row of beer spouts line down the whole bar are crying to be poured.
The tension between bartenders and their own alcohol consumption has been an issue for some time. To constantly be devoured by the UK’s binge culture every time you clock in becomes a heavy load for one person.
“The UK definitely has a binge drinking culture and I think that’s just amplified when you work in a bar. I drank a lot before I did work in bars but then I drank more when I did work in bars,” said Leo Dearden, a 24-year-old assistant manager, and bartender at the Lady Hamilton in London.
There is a constant battle bartenders face, to find their limit and decide when enough is enough, and ask themselves if they really need one more drink. The pandemic certainly did not help the binge drinking culture in the UK.
Lockdowns during the pandemic had the UK population itching to get out and have a wild time at any pub or bar that was open. England’s alcohol sales were through the roof during the lockdown simply because there was nothing else to do.
But the increase in numbers didn’t stop there. Sales of drinks across England went up by 113% as soon as the lockdown mandates were lifted. Alcohol sales began to slow down and return back to normal until the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee began.
Even government policy seemed to encourage a return to pubs, so much so that drinking hours were extended in honor of the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.
“On Monday 25 April, Parliament passed an order to extend licensing hours in pubs, clubs, and bars across England and Wales from 11 pm to 1 am to mark Her Majesty the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee. The extension will cover Thursday 2 June to Saturday 4 June, providing the opportunity for people to continue their celebrations of this historic milestone over the bank holiday,” the home office of the Gov.UK website wrote in April 2022.
Even after sales began to trickle down steadily, there is always something to keep the party going and to have just one more drink. During the Queen’s Jubilee, a two-day bank holiday was included to kick off the festivities and allow people to enjoy block parties, picnics, pubs, bars, and clubs. With bars being so busy, there is plenty of temptations for the bartenders who serve these drinks in a party atmosphere.
According to the Alcohol Rehab Guide, “Bartenders have a higher risk of dying from alcoholism when compared to the rest of the working population. Bartenders are 2.33 times more likely to die from alcoholism than the average employee. Bartending involves possessing a high knowledge of alcohol, which encourages bartenders to drink in larger amounts.”
Eastcheaps Records, a live music bar located right in the city of London, gives people a vibrant and lively atmosphere to enjoy bar bites and pizza with their cocktails and glasses of wine. This location never seemed to lose its clientele throughout the reopening following the lockdown because of the wealthy towering office buildings full of businessmen surrounding it. If the bar doesn’t get a break, neither do the bartenders, which can lead to a lifestyle where alcohol is always at the center.
“It’s strange because if I wasn’t working [in a bar] I wouldn’t necessarily drink as much. You see weird sides of people and you kind of love them and hate them at the same time,” said Sara Kytosaho, the 22-year-old Finnish bartender at Eastcheap Records in London.
Kytosaho, a vibrant brunette with a pretty smile, is originally from Finland and moved to London about three years ago where she now tends a bar in an upscale neighborhood. Because she can see the difference in culture between the UK and Finland, she understands that drinking is a part of everyday life in the UK whereas in Finland it is a special occasion.
She can see the benefits of drinking a little every day in the UK, unlike in Finland. There, she said, when they go out they “don’t leave the bar until the last person passes out.”
When Kytosaho started bartending she was in a new environment and was not used to being surrounded by so much alcohol. Customers were, and still are always asking to buy her drinks because it is a common form of gratuity in the UK.
“In the beginning, I struggled but then you kind of have to say no and stand your ground with this job,” said Kytosaho as she poured a glass of whiskey and handed it to a customer who was listening to the live music. “My relationship with alcohol was healthier before I started working in a bar, can’t lie, but I know my limits and I don’t really need it in my life. But then again it is so available that you’d want to drink more.”
For others, it may not be so easy to turn down a free drink. Leo Dearden, who bartends at the Lady Hamilton in London, believes that his best social outlet is going to bars and going drinking with people and that it’s difficult for that not to be the preferred outlet for a bartender.
Dearden loves the social aspect of bartending, meeting, and talking to new people because it makes him feel connected. With that being said, he understands the struggles that bartenders feel from only being on that side of the bar that’s always making drinks. He says he needs to go on the other side to really feel like a normal person and not like he’s just a service machine.
“When I don’t become a bartender anymore I will drink a lot less, but that is definitely the closest thing to an addiction that I’d say that I have,” said Dearden. “I very much struggle to turn down a drink especially if it’s bought for you or you know it’s busy, you need a shot or something to keep you going for motivation, for energy, for whatever reason, just to be on the same level as everyone else around to have a good time with them.”
Drinking and binge drinking has always been and will always be a part of the UK culture. Although there have been ups and downs with alcohol sales, the stigma and pressure around the drinking culture in the UK will carry on to allow hazardous drinking in the industry, which will continue to be a struggle among bartenders.
