How to bottle 5 thousand non-alcoholic cocktails at a time
I've always wanted F.U.L.L. Bar to fulfill its potential not only during the bar's working hours
but also outside these times, realizing its opportunities as a laboratory.
However, 2020 has
made adjustments to our plans as we have the chance to create amazing tastes. Such an
opportunity, or rather a challenge, came our way just a few days ago.
First of all, it should be noted that we had very little time - this was probably the most
important factor. We had only seven days from the moment of payment for the purchase of
ingredients to the time when the entire batch should be ready, and, with that in mind, we
began the process implementation. The difficulties we have faced included:
• beautiful and identical packaging in the amount of 5 thousand bottles (which was an
extra difficulty task);
• non-alcoholic cocktails are much more difficult to preserve in bottles, there are two ways
(industrial autoclave for sterilization or safe, natural preservatives);
• I cannot but mention that the understanding of how to use a complex of acids to achieve
balance without adding a cloudy colour to the drink came to our rescue because all cocktails
must be of beautiful and transparent colour.
• there was a need to order and test the packaging quickly to see if the box will withstand 20
bottles of 250 ml, taking into account that ten rows will be placed one on top of another inside
the box.
How the whole process was built:
Dmitry Furman, as a mathematician, has calculated the number of human hours required to
implement our ambitious plan, schedule the sequence of processes, order everything
needed and distribute the timely receipt of purchases, since we did not have an opportunity
to order everything in advance because of time limits. Once again, I stress on the fact that
the order was very urgent, and we didn't even have a day of spare time.
After solving the issues of concept, flavour profiles, bottle and label design, the task was to:
• Manage the schedule for receiving goods
• Prepare half-finished product for making three different non-alcoholic cocktails (3 people)
• Organize the process of bottle sterilization (8 people were involved)
• Organize bottling points - 10 people
• Labeling - 3 people
• Packaging - 1 person
• Preparation for shipment and putting distinctive emblems for the logistics department (it
was very important because already on Friday our bottles should go to 5 cities of Ukraine)
On the third day, we went 8 hours ahead of schedule. But there was a case – let’s call it a
collective oversight – when everyone did not pay attention to one detail that cost us 8 hours
of time. After identifying the mistake, I came up to Dmitry, told him about the issue and
asked him to recalculate the timing taking the current situation into account. A few minutes
later Dmitry said: if we add one more bottling point and involve 2 more people, we will be
able to finish in time by 5 am the next day (remember that the logistics company will arrive at
11 am). For 3 days Dmitry was checking our timing every couple of hours to see if we were
on schedule or we needed to speed up. All this time, I had a function to replace everyone
who was tired and, additionally, to control quality standards at all stages.
And guess what? We managed to finish at 5:15 am. Later the company arrived, we carefully
loaded everything into the car and sent the products to satisfied customers.
In conclusion, I must say that I didn’t hear if anyone has placed such an order before –
probably not, but I know for sure that it was a new and very cool experience. The question
here was not about earnings; the main reason was that it was a new peak. Before facing this
task, we didn’t understand how to organize such a process, but now I can say that if
someone contacts us with an order of 10 or 20 thousand items, we will already know for sure
how to organize everything.
Special thanks to the entire team of BARVY restaurant and F.U.L.L. Bar in Kiev, Ukraine. During all these
days, no one complained or said that they were tired and everyone was obsessed with one
idea. I bow down to all of you. I have always had and still have a sincere belief that in this
type of business, the main asset of a businessman is not a chandelier with a price of tens of
but also outside these times, realizing its opportunities as a laboratory. However, 2020 hasours