Here Nor There, Austin. Photo: via 50 Best Discovery.
A national name within twelve months.
The brief
Two rooms at one downtown Austin address — Here Nor There, the hidden-entry, reservation-only speakeasy flagship, and In Plain Sight, its aperitivo-style sister bar. Ambitious drinks, real talent, and the classic growth problem: a menu whose prep load and pour costs hadn’t been engineered to match its ambition.
This was not a concept job. The rooms already had a point of view. The work was making that point of view solvent at Friday volume — the same brief a Program Refresh is built for now.
What we did
- Audited the running menu across live service — prep efficiency, pour costs, and where the drinks were quietly bleeding margin
- Fixed COGS drink by drink: re-costed specs, tightened batching, and rebuilt prep workflows so the ambitious builds could run at Friday volume
- Trained the team on the techniques the program demanded, so execution didn’t depend on any one bartender
- Helped develop the next menu — technique development, prep workflows, and specs built to survive nightly service
The audit happened in service, not on a spreadsheet first. You cannot see a slow build or a wasted garnish from a recipe card. Drink-by-drink costing came after: every spec got a target, and batching was tightened only where integrity allowed. Training was for the techniques the next menu would require — so the room did not need the consultant on the stick to keep the standard.
That sequence is the operations hire described on bar consultant: pour cost as the diagnostic, prep as the fix, the team as the handoff.
What changed
- In Plain Sight named a Spirited Awards 2023 U.S. Regional Top 10 Honoree — Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar — within twelve months
- Coverage in The Infatuation, Austin Chronicle, and Eater Austin
- The rooms became the place Austin bartenders go on their own nights off — the industry’s honest review
The Spirited honoree is the public line. The operational line is that the ambitious builds still ran on a Friday. Press followed the rooms; it was not the brief.
What this informs now
Rooms that already have talent and a list, and are losing money or consistency, do not need a new identity. They need the existing one engineered. New York rooms with that problem start at bar consultant NYC. Hotel F&B openings with two dayparts and a volume problem start at hotel bar consultant. All five cases: Work.