Pittsburgh Bartending –Promote Promote Promote

February 22nd, 2008

We were looking at some information on Pittsburgh bars and noticed a tiny little fact that provides a tremendous opportunity.

There are very few bars in the region that provide Sentanta Sports. It is a premier soccer/rugby/European sports network with either live or delayed top quality soccer matches and Rugby matches from Europe and Australia. Its one of the great soccer channels available. In fact we were amazed at how relatively few such bars there are relative to the population and compared to some other cities where we have operated bartending schools.

Now maybe Pittsburgh isn’t the center of fandom for British top notch soccer….but you know something there are a ton of soccer teams in the region, lots of soccer fans, overall sports fans, and people who can get intrigued by the special European style of cheering and rooting that is so different from American sports phenomena. Its exciting.

With so few bars offering this entertainment we looked at a portion of the population to try and see where we could get customers.

Did you know there are over 40 or 50 adult soccer leagues in the Pittsburgh area. They recruit players. People advertise to join them. They range in age from probably teenagers to over 40’s. There are men’s and women’s leagues. And that is just from a quick view.

On top of that there are 10 colleges in Allegheny County and over 30 colleges in the region. Many of them have male and female teams and they probably have intramural teams on top of that.

These players have friends, fans, and families that probably also like the game. That is several thousand potential customers, a chance to get them to network to other potential customers…and a tremendous opportunity to attract them to the very few bars in the region that show Setanta sports. (by the way…we have no association with Setanta sports)

If I were showing those games I’d be marketing into these crowds and groups regularly. They aren’t that hard to reach. We found some of this information in about 1/2 an hour.

You know what else is great about these games, from the bar owners perspective? The games are often early in the day. That means that if you either operate a bar or are a bartender you can bring in a crowd at a time when the bar is often quiet.

Now if I’m a bartender at one of these establishments, or more realistically an owner, I’d be specifically marketing into these and other groups in the city and region on a regular basis.

You can’t stop the marketing effort. With ten local colleges and universities in the region and over 30 universities–with about 50,000 students in the County and over 130,000 in the greater Southeast PA region, there is a lot of turnover.

But with so little competition for this premium specialty sports network its an amazing opportunity.

We know there are endless promotion opportunities. Bar operators explore them all the time. Great bartenders learn how to promote their shifts and build business. Frankly one of the great experiences in the business is to turn a slow shift or a slow day into a busy profitable day where the crowd is having a lot of fun.

Having operated bartending schools, bars, been bartenders, managed and owned we have seen a lot of opportunities and experiences over the years. We just found this one to be a potential gem. Contact us if you want to explore other ideas.