CELEBRITY
SPORTS
GAMING
MOVIESHow To Be A Bouncer
Checking IDs is the backbone of bouncing, and requires proper technique to perfect. Amateur bouncers might argue, “It just involves reading some numbers off a plastic card! It could be done by anyone with an IQ over 78 or a well-trained chimpanzee.” This is 100% accurate. That’s why it’s necessary to make a huge production out of the whole affair.
Do like I did. When you see club patrons approaching, yell at them in a commanding, vaguely on-the-verge-of-losing-it voice, “HAVE YOUR ID OUT OR YOU’RE NOT GETTING IN!” If possible, give the patrons demeaning nicknames while doing so, like “Shorto” or “Cabbage-Ass”.
Also important: Always request that the patrons make an orderly line against the wall. There’s no reason for this, but it will give you time to make up better nicknames.
With this done, pull out your flashlight (see list of bouncer supplies above) and shine it on the ID. Be sure to hold the flashlight over your head, shining the light downwards. This gives the appearance that you’ve been trained in special flashlight use not available to the general public.
Now comes the fun part. No matter how old a patron looks, do the following:
- Look at their ID.
- Then look at their face.
- Then look at their ID.
- Then look at their face.
- Once more look at their ID.
- Then look at their face.
- Again look at their face.
- Again look at their ID.
This interaction should be executed while moving your head in sharp, dramatic motions in the directions of both the ID and the face. The key here is to intimidate the patron and/or the patron’s ID. Are they old enough? Are they pulling a fast one? Their scam might play down at the Viper Room, but not with you, damn it!
Also: Be sure to randomly ask someone to repeat their home address. Have them do it a second time, but request they do it much louder. When they do, wait a few minutes, then say “Okay.”
Or: Take someone’s ID and act like you’re talking on your unplugged headset to someone (as if you need to check something out). After a few minutes give the ID back and say “Okay.”
The velvet rope and orange pylon cone at the front of a club entrance are all-important. The purpose of the velvet rope is to make patrons feel like it’s a special privilege when they’re finally allowed to walk into the club. It also makes people feel extremely excluded when denied club entrance (and making people feel really excluded is one of the duties of the club bouncer).
Here’s how it worked for me. Two patrons approach the club. They saw my strategically placed velvet rope and thus stopped, second-guessing themselves. I used this opportunity to yell “Have your ID out or you’re not getting in! Don’t toy with me, I’m JUST-NOT-IN-THE-MOOD!”
Once IDs were checked (see above), you might want to do what I did, saying to the party:
“You have to go through the rope.”
“Really?! Okay.”
Then throw in (and stress) “You have to go through the rope and around the cone!”
“Why?”
“City zoning regulations!”
If the party refuses, throw in, “DON’T’ TOY WITH ME, I’M JUST NOT IN THE MOOD!”
Another good use of the velvet rope is to deny groups of men entrance into the club. Here’s the twist: The minute a group women request club entrance, immediately let them go right in, holding open the velvet rope and smoothing “Right this way, Ladies!” If the group of men questions your preferential treatment, simply scream: “DON’T TOY WITH ME, I’M JUST NOT IN THE MOOD!”
Funnily enough anyone who actually works in the industry will see this article as just really baseless, misinformed and ultimately petty shots at actually standard practices, stuff that is there for really good reasons no less.
The rope is there to seperate doormen from patrons and regulate the entry/exit into a venue. Telling people to line up is not only a venune licensing requirement (in Aus/UK anyway) but also to prevent possible altercations between patrons and/or the public, because drunk people don’t like getting bumped into.
The headsets are plugged in, which may be a suprise to you, and are also one of the most effective safety equipment any guard will have. Those little headsets have saved lives across the world; both of patrons and staff. A flat radio battery has in the past have resulted in harm for Crowd Controllers, it is a terrible situation to be surrounded by hostile patrons without any way to contact other guards.
Crowd Controllers take ID checks seriously because if the police find underage patrons inside a club the management of the venue can be fined thousands of dollars. Because of insurance, standard operating practices and regulations, these fines may actually find their way to being the responsibility of the individual crowd controller. So if you feel that looking back and forth from ID to face is a funny, ask yourself if the guard is perhaps just trying to make sure he doesn’t sink his life by making a bad judgement call.
There is a ton of things that can be made fun of within the security industry, however this article picks out the only things which actually make sense to implement. It is like making a joke of firemen for having a truck and protective gear; I bet they don’t really even connect their firehoses to anything, they just want to look cool and heroic. It just sounds stupid and childish to even write something like that, let alone a whole article on it.
Seriously if this is the best you can come up with, you might as well be making fun of airplane food.