Christmas is coming and it's not just the geese that should be getting fat! The festive season presents a gift-wrapped opportunity for clubs to plump up their bottom line by offering their customers a wide range of product old and new.

This time of year is perfect for club stewards and managers to play Santa by surprising occasional visitors - the kids, mums, dads and friends of members, who only visit the club at Christmas - with the range of products on offer. A good stock of perennial favourites and seasonal spirits, a full range of soft drinks and low-alcohol options for drivers and children, plus a choice of snacks, combined with a party atmosphere, are all guaranteed to bring people back to the club again and again over the holidays. And you can bet, too, that it'll encourage them to become members or regular visitors once everything gets back to normal in chilly January!

At the time of year when top-shelf spirits are a regular purchase rather than a special treat, companies such as Guinness UDV, Allied Domecq and First Drinks are putting a major bash behind their key brands.

"Last Christmas, on-trade sales were the highest ever for Baileys, followed closely by Smirnoff, Bell's and Gordon's" says Guinness UDV's commercial director, Tony Mair. This year the company is investing in strong TV advertising and heavyweight promotional support and recommends that clubs ensure they have full stocks of all the major brands. Bell's are rocking-and-rolling out their Jools Holland "All In The Blend" TV commercials, a massive £4m is being spent on TV to promote Smirnoff vodka and Gordon's is, of course, synonymous with gin. With Johnnie Walker Black Label whisky, Archers and Southern Comfort amongst their other brands, GUDV products are a back-bar must.

Richard Hayes, the acting marketing director at Allied Domecq UK, is keen to promote one specific area of service, particularly in relation to his Tia Maria product. "A great way to serve liqueurs is to encourage drinkers to try them as a long drink, with a mixer" he says. Although not wishing to put off those who prefer to take their liqueurs short and sweet and after dinner, Richard points out that this way, of course, you get the profit on the mixer too! Over 60% of Tia Maria drinkers in the on-trade take it with cola, so why not get your staff to suggest trying it with a mixer when customers request it on its own? With £2.7 million-worth of national TV ads running in November and December, the words Tia Maria, as well as the product, should be on everyone's lips this Christmas!

First Drinks distribute a raft of brands in the UK, including Grant's and Glenfiddich scotch whiskies, Stolichnaya vodka, Campari, Taboo and festive season stalwarts Warninks Advocaat and Tio Pepe and Croft sherries. The company's Alec Guthrie is full of useful tips for club stewards, managers and staff to help maximise sales. "Think about what are your most popular products during the rest of the year" he advises, "and make sure you have full stocks of them. Consider trading up to magnums or gallons - it'll save time changing bottles at busy periods and lets the customer know that you treat the brand with respect and that you sell a lot of it! And try banking your spirits in order, say, dark to light, so that the customers and staff both know where to find them. It's also important to make sure that you have the right brands on the right optics and that bottle labels are inverted."

At Christmas, members and their guests are far more likely to try out different, more upmarket drinks and premium brands such as Glenfiddich, Southern Comfort, Jack Daniel's and Grant's Ale Cask Reserve and Sherry Cask Reserve whiskies are natural alternatives to everyday favourite tipples. "JD" is benefiting from a £2 million marketing investment and Southern Comfort has been repackaged and has a £2.5 million marketing campaign beginning this month, so make sure you have plenty on hand for your 21 - 35 year-old male members and their guests. Grant's TV advertising for their Cask Reserve premium blends, which features "unforgettable finishes" such as the 1966 World Cup Final and the collapse of the Berlin Wall, is supported by the production of point-of-sale kits including tent cards, drip mats and ice buckets, as well as a widespread promotional campaign in the on-trade.

"Do ensure that your promotions are easy to manage, to give staff time to run them and still to serve quickly and efficiently" Alec goes on, "and once the club gets busy, stop the promotion and run it again the next night, to get customers in earlier."

The importance of the serve is stressed by many of the major suppliers. Guinness UDV is pioneering the drive to improve the standard of serve under the banner "Every Serve Perfect" (ESP). A booklet is available to licensees and barstaff which covers tips on service and up-selling, as well as training advice. ESP focuses on three areas - the measure, which encourages clubs and customers to trade up to 35ml shots, the serve itself, concentrating on presentation and the range, covering the right brand choice for the individual club or bar and its customers. First Drinks's Alec Guthrie says "Make sure you present the product professionally, in the right glass and don't forget to offer doubles. That way, customers come to the bar less frequently, speeding up your service. And try to up-sell doubles customers to a baby mixer rather than post-mix, to drive a higher margin."

So if you're looking for the ho-ho-ho to last long after Christmas, deck your halls with loads of product, to ensure you and your bank manager, as well as your members, have a very Happy New Year! Cheers!

PANEL: Low-alcohol Christmas

With more people than ever taking a responsible approach to drinking and driving and police forces country-wide likely to step up their campaigns over the festive season, now is the time to stock up on NABLABs and softs!

"Soft drinks are appealing to a wide audience who want choice, variety and value" says Britvic's Sue Garfitt, "and understanding their importance can really grow a club's profit." The 300ml Pepsi glass bottle, a 180ml cranberry mixer and the still-growing J2O fruit drink range can all help clubs to build an impressive softs offer and to give customers a choice, so important as consumers become more demanding and sophisticated in their tastes.

The no- and lo-alcohol brands have suffered in previous years from an inferior taste perception. All that has changed, though, as brands such as Clausthaler are reformulated, but it is vital to get the message across by the best possible method - tasting. With this in mind, Surfax, brewers of Clausthaler in the UK, are offering a "buy 3 cases, get 1 free" deal for Christmas. "The name of the game is to get people to try it" says Surfax's Peter Karsten "and I know they'll be impressed. We entered it for fun in the alcoholic sector at IFE and it won a bronze medal!" And don't let your customers worry that it could make them drunk - wholemeal bread and orange juice contain twice as much alcohol as Clausthaler!

The season of goodwill is a great time to put a mistle-toe in the water and try offering new and different products. Hartridges are renowned in the softs marketplace for innovation and adding value and their range of organic juices are surprisingly good value. "People think they're paying more for all the organic bull****, but we're taking the mystique out of organics and their pricing!" says Martin Hartridge. "We offer 24 x 275ml glass bottles of organic orange, apple or pink grapefruit juices for £12 + VAT, which clubs could sell at 80p or more per bottle." The company also produces a full range of non-organic juices and Martin maintains that it is much easier at Christmas to up-sell to premium soft products. "If people ask for a soft drink, for Pete's sake don't suggest a boring lemonade!" he says, "soft drinks should be a celebration, not a penalty!"

Following on from the raft of energy drinks now available, such as Red Bull and it's various me-too's, start-up brand-owner Superstar Beverages/Masio Marketing has just launched XES into the nightclub market and is set to move it across the board into the on-trade. "We call XES 'liquid passion'" says Masio's Ashraf Sharif, "as it's the first gender-specific drink in the world." 'XES pour homme' comes in a 250ml blue and silver can and is beer-coloured, with the 'pour femme' variety packaged in red and silver and looking more like champagne. Both have an RSP of £1.29 in the on-trade. Ashraf claims aphrodisiacal qualities for the brand and describes the taste as adult - borne out by the fact that when you turn the XES can upside down, the name reads as…er…work it out for yourselves!

Here are Britvic's top tips for maximising soft drinks profits this Christmas:

Promote larger servings. Call your smallest draught size 'kids', in order to encourage adults to upsize to 16oz glasses or premium packaged soft drinks.

Encourage your staff to ask your customers if they would like a drink when they order food - a soft drink is consumed with half of all meals.

Ensure your premium range of packaged soft drinks is served chilled - half of all customers are prepared to pay more for cold drinks.

Put the range of premium soft drinks on display in the back bar area to raise awareness.

Offer buckets of premium packaged soft drinks for a set price or within meal deals, especially at peak times.

Children become brand-aware at an early age - offer them a specific kids selection of the biggest brands.

SIDEBAR - snacks and party planning

"Christmas is a great time of year for snacks, especially nut products" says Gary White, Trade Sector Manager of Golden Wonder. "It's the ideal time to trial new products, as people are more receptive." Gary stresses the importance of offering snack products on the bar for free tasting, to encourage sales and recommends stocking a full range - Golden Wonder's products include normal and dry-roasted peanuts, pistachio, cashews, mixed nuts and raisins and Mexican chilli-coated nuts.

"Display is vital, as crisps and snacks are an impulse purchase" says Steve Flanagan, KP's Foodservice Category Trade Manager. "Premium snacks are key to the club trade, as people are often looking for an alternative to the standard crisps offer in pubs - more of a 'big eat'" he adds. KP offers the strongly-flavoured McCoys crisps, the market-leading KP nuts range and the Mini Cheddars baked snack.

Party planning suppliers such as TDH Promotions, Business Builders, Peeks and Smiffy's come into their own around the festive season and Pat Whalley from Business Builders emphasises the importance of ordering party packs and novelties early and making sure clubs carry enough stock to last through to New Year. "Party poppers are our best sellers" Pat says, "but hats and other novelties are also in huge demand."

SIDEBAR - EPOS systems

If you've ever sweated over ledgers in an attempt to calculate sales, profit or margin comparisons year on year, now may be the time to consider an electronic point-of-sale (EPOS) system to help you to avoid the Christmas paper chain!

Clarity Retail Systems offers computer-based methods of incentivising staff to sell more by logging who sells what and how much - bonuses can then be awarded based on results. The unique software also allows stewards and managers to see how much business you've done, product by product, drink by drink, hour by hour, day by day, year on year, and includes a live link which adjusts your stock drink by drink. The system will even suggest how much product you should order from each supplier and prepare a purchase order!

In addition, Clarity systems can keep a close eye on what is often referred to as 'the human factor'! You can check on barstaff who you suspect of giving away drinks to friends or overcharging with just a few mouse-clicks, as well as reviewing every transaction instantly from your back-office computer. "Christmas is a club's busiest time, so if you lose money then, you'll lose more than at any other time of year" says David McIntosh, Clarity's sales director, providing a timely reminder that Christmas can provide a perfect opportunity for unscrupulous casual labour to impact severely on a club's bottom line.