back-bar business
Keep a friendly eye on the
freshers
With thousands of students about to start university, alcohol education charity Drinkaware is encouraging operators to invest in staff and other resources to ensure a safe and enjoyable Freshers’ Week in their venues.
Posters to inform customers can be downloaded free of charge from the Drinkaware website
Nightlife Crew, the charity’s night-time safety teams, operate in student venues across the country. Team members, who are usually drawn from the student population, receive training that equips them to both promote a more positive atmosphere within the venues, and help students who might become vulnerable after drinking. Drinkaware chiefexecutive Elaine Hindal says: “Freshers’ Week is an exciting time for students starting at university, but it comes with a risk of alcohol harms: many of these young people are away from home for the first time, socialising with new people who may have different drinking habits, in an unfamiliar venue. It’s easy for things to go wrong. “Operators targeting the freshers market really owe it to these students to create an environment where the chances of them coming to any harm are minimised, with robust safety nets in place if they do become vulnerable as a result of alcohol.” Drinkaware recently carried out research among young people at nine venues where Nightlife Crew is in operation. Four in five said they felt more positive about a venue with Nightlife Crew in place and three in four would be willing to pay £1 more for entry if a venue offered Nightlife Crew.1 University of Leicester Students’
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Union has employed Nightlife Crew for the last three years, with the teams playing a vital role at the 2,000-people capacity O2 venue on campus. Freshers’ Week is the busiest of the year with four sell-out events during the week. Marianna Papaleontiou, student advisor at Leicester, says: “Nightlife Crew fulfil an important role in our student safeguarding strategy all year and particularly during Freshers’ Week.
Student to student support
“The team members are young – usually students in their second year and upwards – so they have a better rapport with our student customers than the older security personnel, for example. Our students feel comfortable approaching the Nightlife Crew team members if they feel unwell or unsafe, or are worried about a friend. Equally Nightlife Crew are trained to look out for behaviour cues that indicate someone might become vulnerable during the evening, and keep a watchful eye on them. “As a result, the team is often able to intervene in a potentially harmful situation early on and prevent it spiralling out of control.” Ahead of the new academic year, Marianna is recruiting new members to join the 15-strong Nightlife Crew team, to replace those who have graduated or become too busy with studies. With pool of this size of trained team members, Marianna can en-
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