Par Level

What par level actually means

Par level is the number of bottles, cases, or kegs you should always have in the building to avoid running dry between deliveries. It is not your ideal stock. It is the floor. If you hit par, you order. If you drop below par, you screwed up.

Par lives in Inventory for a reason. It is the single lever that controls whether you 86 your top-selling bourbon on a Saturday night.

How it is used on the floor

Most bars set par as a handwritten number on a shelf tag or a line on a spreadsheet. Bar manager walks the wall on Sunday, counts what is left, and compares each bottle to its par. Anything at or below par goes on the order sheet.

Good par levels account for delivery frequency, sales velocity, and a small safety buffer. A bar that takes Tito’s deliveries once a week needs a higher par than one that gets them twice a week.

Setting par the right way

The formula most operators use:

Par = (average weekly usage) + (safety stock)

Example: you pour 8 bottles of Jameson a week. Your safety stock is 2 bottles. Par is 10. When Sunday count shows 10 or fewer, you order 8 to get back to 18 on the shelf after delivery.

Common mistakes

New managers set par by gut feel, not data. They over-par the well vodka and under-par the tequila they drink themselves. Result: cash tied up in dead stock and 86’d calls on busy nights.

Another trap is never updating par. Sales shift by season. Your summer rosé par should not be your February par. Review par levels quarterly.

How PourIQ handles it

PourIQ tracks usage rate for every SKU and auto-suggests par levels based on your actual sales velocity and delivery cadence. When a bottle drops below par during a count, it flags automatically and drops onto your order sheet. No more guessing whether you need another case of Espolon.