Confessions of an Australian Bar Maid: Creature Chameleons – The Venue Duty Manager

Imagine being a manager of sorts for your own household – ensuring everyone under your roof keeps things clean, does their respective jobs, takes time out to have a break every now and then, ensure everyone is fed and watered, ensure visitors don’t overstay their welcome and leave things exactly as they found them, that someone is always answering the phone, that no undesirables cross the threshold, and so on and so forth. Kind of like a Mum!

That in a nutshell is the job of a venue duty manager. Every job that exists within a venue comes under their rule, be it bar, security, band, promoter, cleaner or driver. Everyone who’s anyone who wants anything done, answered, undone or cleaned will be looking for the duty manager. Their powers reach far and wide and must be adhered to no matter who you are.

You can spot them almost instantly in any venue. They have a 2-way radio, a pen, a sharpie, a role of gaffa tape and a bottle opener always somewhere on their person, and they walk with a look of intense concentration and determination on their face. Concentrating on the 1 million things they have to do and determined not be asked yet another stupid question by some half wit staff member or band manager about rider, dishcloths, beer taps and the like.

Depending on the scale of the event this concentration and determination may be given then chance to wane mid-evening when the band is on stage, when the punters are sufficiently distracted and boozed up and staff are having their breaks. It is in this minuscule lull that the duty manager may possibly have the chance to rest one bum cheek on a chair, half-scratch and itch they’ve had all night and inhale one tenth of a cigarette. But once the band cease to play the excitement unfolds once again as punters lose belongings or fall down stairs, tour vans demand release from garages and bar tills count up wrong again and again and again.

But once the shows over that’s it right? The duty manager is off the hook? He can go home, can he not? Oh no my friends. For with great responsibility comes many keys. Many many keys. Keys to front doors and back doors, to pool tables, and more importantly, to liquor cabinets. And there’s nothing bar staff like more than an after work staffie or 12, especially when they don’t have to lock up.