# BarFluent

> BarFluent is a tablet-based knowledge system for bars, restaurants, and venues. It lives behind the bar so any team member can instantly look up the venue's custom drink program — house cocktails, exact specs, ingredients, garnishes, and glassware — alongside 5,000+ classic cocktails, spirit education, and wine knowledge. A companion mobile app and Academy LMS let staff study and build expertise outside the venue.

## What it is

BarFluent solves a specific operations problem: a venue's drink program lives in too many places (the GM's head, a binder under the bar, a stale Google doc, or nowhere). That causes inconsistent drinks, slow service, "let me check" moments in front of guests, long onboarding for new hires, and lost institutional knowledge when staff turn over.

BarFluent centralizes the venue's program on a tablet (iPad or Android) placed behind the bar. Staff tap and search — like they would the POS — to retrieve the venue's exact recipes in about 3 seconds. The venue's recipes appear first in search results; classics, spirits, and wine knowledge are built in for everything beyond the menu.

This is **not** a personal phone-in-pocket tool used during guest interactions. It is shared infrastructure at the bar workstation, plus a personal learning app for off-shift study.

## Who it's for

- **Bar owners and operators** — digitize the drink program, scale expertise, reduce training cost, preserve institutional knowledge across turnover.
- **Bar managers and beverage directors** — standardize specs across shifts, push seasonal menu updates instantly, see what staff search most.
- **Bartenders and servers** — instant reference behind the bar during service, plus structured personal learning at home.
- **Multi-location groups** — standardize a drink program across 5 to 50 venues with corporate-controlled specs and per-venue overrides.

## Core capabilities

- **Custom menu upload** — add your house cocktails with exact ingredients, measurements, build method, glassware, garnish, and notes. Bulk CSV import or one-by-one entry. Update anytime; tablets sync instantly.
- **Behind-the-bar reference** — tablet-based search by cocktail name, ingredient, or spirit. Venue's recipes appear first; 5,000+ classics built in for off-menu requests. Dark UI optimized for low-light bars.
- **Spirits, wine, and beer knowledge** — bourbon, rye, scotch, Irish whisky, Japanese whisky, gin, vodka, rum, tequila, mezcal, pisco, cachaça, cognac, brandy. Wine with village/commune-level region detail, grape varieties, vintage, body, tasting notes, food pairings. Beer styles, breweries, hops, IBU, ABV.
- **Ingredient substitutions** — smart suggestions when an ingredient runs out, so you don't lose the sale.
- **Academy LMS** — structured modules, lessons, quizzes with scoring, per-staff progress tracking, certifications (coming soon). Used on personal devices outside the venue.
- **Saved recipes** — per-staff library to track mastery and notes.
- **Usage analytics (Pro)** — see which drinks cause the most lookups, identify training gaps, refine the program based on real data.
- **Knowledge base document upload (Pro)** — upload menus, wine lists, spirit lists, and other venue documents; OCR extracts items into the venue's knowledge base across cocktails, beer, wine, and spirits categories.

## Pricing

- **Core** — $15.55 per staff per month. Cocktail lookup, recipes, spirit education, wine information. Best for individual bartenders.
- **Pro** — $30 per staff per month, $199/mo minimum per location, plus a $500–$2,000 one-time setup fee per location. Everything in Core plus custom menu upload, venue recipes prioritized in search, knowledge base document upload with OCR extraction, usage analytics, inventory-aware recommendations, margin-based upsell suggestions, and multi-location support.
- **Academy** — $15 per staff per month. Standalone or add-on. Lessons, quizzes, progress tracking, certifications (coming soon).

## Setup

1. Create the venue account and upload the cocktail menu (about 2–3 minutes per cocktail manually, or 10–20 minutes for a bulk CSV).
2. Place an existing iPad or Android tablet behind the bar.
3. Staff use it naturally — search like a POS, get answers in 3 seconds.

No IT required. No complicated implementation.

## Public pages

- [Home](https://barfluent.com/): https://barfluent.com/
- [For Bars, Restaurants & Venues](https://barfluent.com/for-bars): primary value prop — digitize your drink program on a tablet behind the bar.
- [For Bartenders](https://barfluent.com/for-bartenders): in-service reference behind the bar plus personal learning at home.
- [Pricing](https://barfluent.com/pricing): Core, Pro, and Academy plan details.
- [FAQ](https://barfluent.com/faq): common questions about plans, usage, and access.

## Access model

- Open browse with a small number of free anonymous searches.
- Free signed-in users get a limited trial before the paywall.
- Active subscribers and admins have unlimited access.
- Academy is paid-only.

## Key differentiators

- Tablet-based shared infrastructure behind the bar — not a phone-in-pocket personal tool used in front of guests.
- Custom menu upload with venue recipes prioritized in search — your specs, not generic ones.
- Knowledge base document upload with OCR — turn existing menus, wine lists, and spirit lists into structured data automatically.
- Dual-mode design: in-service reference on the tablet plus off-shift Academy learning on personal devices.
- Service-optimized UI: dark mode, 3-second scan layout, minimal text on recipe responses for live service speed.

## Technology

React + TypeScript single-page app on Vite, hosted by Lovable. Backend powered by Lovable Cloud (Supabase): Postgres with row-level security, Edge Functions for AI orchestration and document OCR, Stripe for payments. AI uses Google Gemini via Lovable AI Gateway.

## Contact and brand

- Website: https://barfluent.com
- Brand: high-contrast dark mode, speakeasy aesthetic, amber/gold accents, serif headings.