19 Ounce Pint

On a personal note - yesterday pretty much sucked. I am starting to have some conflicts between work and home, which resulted last night around 6:30 with me needing to be in 2 places at one time. Unfortunately, at the time that I am writing this, I am unable to do that thing that Hermione does in Harry Potter.

Whenever I get frustrated like this, there is a story I like to remember. Once upon a time, I worked for a chain of drinking establishments (which shall remain nameless). The company's Chief Operating Officer (COO) wanted to add some corporate level staff, but the CEO told him he could only add staff if he cut his beverage costs by 5%. In regards to suppliers and pricing, things were pretty much at a standstill, so it appeared there was not much to be done. Over the next few months, we noticed a trend which culminated in beverage costs reducing approximately 5% from where they started. At this time, the COO asked for his additional staff requests to be approved.

The COO finally explained how he lowered beverage costs 5%. He found a glass which held 19 ounces, but looked identical to a traditional 20 ounce imperial U.K. pint glass. Gradually over the course of these few months, he phased in these new glasses to all of our locations.

I will leave it to you to discuss the ethics of how this was handled, but the story always reminds me that for every problem, somewhere out there is an answer.