Supporting craft breweries

TaurenDruid

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123944851#Comment_123944851

Well, friends who drink there regularly drove past last night and said it was open…

BeerNut

Inconsistent opening hours are a result of not enough customers, not a cause of it. There just don't seem to be enough people in Dublin to sustain a specialist beer bar. Most of the pubs with significant beer rotation are dependent on tourists, as are plenty that don't. UnderDog depended on us, and there aren't enough of us.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123946133#Comment_123946133

"There just don't seem to be enough people in Dublin to sustain a specialist beer bar"

I refuse to believe that. If it can be done in Cork and Galway it can be done in Dublin. I know some of ye have a personal connection to the owners but honestly it was a pretty average spot from my point of view as a tourist. I visit Dublin and Cork regularly enough and have some must visit pubs in both. I tried my best with that place but it wasn't great.

And inconsistent hours will most certainly kill a troubled spot. If you are at that point just same yourself the castle and lock up.

Passenger

That location has had how many iterations of bars over the years? None worked long-term. Location has to have a part to play.

hynesie08

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123946229#Comment_123946229

I wanna say 6 pubs, an off license and a place that sold chicken burgers out of vending machines in the last 15-20 years.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123946229#Comment_123946229

To many people think the beer is enough and don't look at it as a pub first. The place needs to be strong enough to add a casual or barely interested about beer crowd too.

If you go to Bierhaus in Cork plenty of lads are helping pay the bills with pints of lager.

Only an actual brewery can maybe get away with being a threadbare pub.

Blisterman

I think not being on Untappd was a fatal mistake. It's the first place their target audience are looking for when they arrive into a city. Certainly it's my go to when I'm looking for good local beer bars anywhere I go.

Underdog's location being where it was, means you're not going to casually stumble across it. You need to know about it.

BeerNut

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123946327#Comment_123946327

And yet the threadbare pub with a geek-oriented taplist is a staple of major cities right across Europe, including the UK.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123946866#Comment_123946866

Maybe in other parts of Europe where the look of a pub is looser but I don't remember many really famous or sucessful ones in the UK that were not attached to a brewery. There were a few like the Mother Kellys chain or The Rake Borough Market which has a serious USP but it's not common.

JayRoc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123946462#Comment_123946462

Respectfully disagree. There are lots of reasons for a pub to struggle (Paddy does a great job but I personally haven't been in there for months because going to a pub, especially one in town, is something I can't afford right now) but the idea that one app listing would make that much of a difference is just not realistic. IMO

Bigger issues. Far bigger issues

JoeLapira

Such a same to see the Underdog closing and I’m sure we can all sit here and talk about why the reasons are. For me it’s our drinking culture. The vast, vast majority of drinkers in this country have no interest in what Paddy has to offer, particularly in Dublin. Punters in Dublin want a place that’s  cool, hip, on trend and it helps if it’s serving “creamy pints” of the blandest stout in the country. Underdog was really none of those things, the lack of food doesn’t help either. Dublins craft beer scene is becoming more and more sparse, particularly compared to the glory days of P.Macs etc. 

Black Sheep

I have friends who are absolutely into craft beer... maybe not top tier neckbeard beer aficionados, like some of us, but into it.... and they would always vote me down in terms of where to go, if I brought up Underdog:-

Their reasons:-

- the location ... not many's first choice, of a night out

- keen on a buzzier vibe, with a more mixed crowd (more women)..

- sometimes not that many session ABV options

We generally end up in Fidelity, Caribou or Bonobos. Decent craft beer selections in all of them, and they'd just say they were better for an evening out on other fronts... Difficult to disagree.

If I was with the missus it would be Fidelity or The Big Romance!

Underdog for me was more a "pop in if I'm passing, for a solo drink" kind of place.

I wouldn't have thought the decor was much of a factor. Chairs were cheap alright, but Paddy used to say he had what he had to spend and that was it. IMO People are used to more bare bones cafes and restaurants these days, suspect this was not that big of a deal for people, compared to other stuff mentioned above.

Inconsistent opening hours absolutely do put people off. Bit of a vicious circle.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123947345#Comment_123947345

"More women" 🤣

That one really took me back. Some craft pubs and festivals were bad but anything to do with cask beer was worse. Even in London women working in the industry were like celebrities.

JayRoc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123947428#Comment_123947428

I was working in a brewery a couple of years back and a 3-man (3-person?) team of specialists had come over from the UK to fix some piece of equipment and one of them was a girl.

The guts of a week with a girl on the brewery floor; there was barely a tap of work done by our lads all week.

Black Sheep

Haha, yeah I am obviously mentioning the preference for "more women" in the context of a bar's atmosphere and makeup moreso than in an industry representation sense. I'm less bothered about that - suspect we mostly agree male or female will be present in particular fields to a greater or lesser degree.

But in terms of makeup of a pub clientele.. Yeah, if you have two bars serving a few craft beers, fair to say id rather be sitting in the one that has a mixed crowd versus one that is all male.

The mainly male environment can put women off, once its established.

I think you are more likely to get stuff like certain type of fairly musty beer geek who can be a challenging, in terms of hygiene and social skills. Like the phenomenon where some beer oracle sitting at the bar will never offer unsolicited advice to male punters about beers available... But will always seem to "help" any women coming into his orbit.

Yeah Right

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123946240#Comment_123946240

Underdog - Mexican place - the GBB bar (Paddle & Peele?) - The Beerhouse - The off-licence place…….Almost certain it was a vape shop at one stage too.

TaurenDruid

I used to work on Capel Street so remember that venue being the home of at least three other pubs over the past 15 years. Location is a factor, definitely. It's not somewhere you'll stumble across.

The layout of the place is a factor, too. Our 'drinking group' usually varies between 3 and 6, with exceptions, mostly 5 or 6. (Equal split male and female, often with more women!) We're therefore limited to the booths at the back or if we're in early enough, grabbing two tables along the bench at the front. That's it. The long and narrow layout really doesn't help.

Inconsistency in opening times is definitely a vicious circle. "Will we head up to Underdog?" "Dunno - is it open?" "Dunno. Nah, let's just go in the Black Sheep." Lack of communication on socials is an issue. Only on Insta that I'm aware of, posts not all that common. I dunno what sort of numbers would be visitors in your average craft beer pub, as opposed to locals, but from experience, when I'm heading somewhere on a holiday or long weekend, yes, I'm looking up Untappd. There aren't a dozen beer apps - Untappd is pretty much the universal go-to. (Taplist is great, but doesn't do the same thing!)

Lack of any food except crisps doesn't help, but Paddy was grand about people ordering in.

The lack of low-ABV session ales in a speciality craft beer pub might be an issue. I love a good imperial stout, but if I'm out for my weekly session with my mates I want to have four or five pints, and I can't do that just drinking Imperials or DIPAs. I'd mentioned there I could actually have more "session" IPAs in my local suburban Diageo/Heineken pub than Underdog, because they had both Open Gate and Lagunitas. Paddy said breweries weren't supplying session ales? I'm pretty sure O'Hara's and White Hag would both have supplied kegs to go with the Kinnegar if they'd been asked.

hynesie08

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123948298#Comment_123948298

The Mexican place was GBB as well. It was a Lithuanian bar for a short run as well, the vape cafe is directly next door.

L1011

Was also another sort of craft bar called The Last Waterhole before it was Beerhouse, but after being the orange off-licence.

Black Sheep

Some places are just "pitches of death".

I remember where Against The Grain was, on Camden Street. It was a very odd L-shape, and before ATG, there was a succession of failed bars there… I think before ATG is was called Nasdaq.

But ATG bucked the trend and was wildly successful… For a period of time anyway..

Passenger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123948434#Comment_123948434

The pub that replaced ATG didn't appear to have lasted long either. The builders are currently in stripping the place.

L1011

GBB have/had a knack of resetting serial failures. Black Sheep and Brew Dock were both like that before them, as was the Beer Traders which they've since left

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123948472#Comment_123948472

Before becoming failures themselves 🤣

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123948483#Comment_123948483

Still managed 10 years+ in some of them, whereas ATG would have had eight names in that time period otherwise.

But yes, their decline in Dublin is terrifying really.

Passenger

Just walked past the former ATG a minute ago. Signs up for an upcoming cocktail bar opening soon.

JayRoc

II will say that any inconsistency regarding opening hours is a big big no-no as far as I'm concerned.

Far better to be open set hours even 3-4 days a week than to have a punter think "I might go there (and go out of my way to do it) only, will it be open?"

BeerNut

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123948357#Comment_123948357

I don't recall that name. It was O'Byrne's Beverage House in 2010/11.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123948696#Comment_123948696

It wasn't the name for long. Was also Ruta for a bit. There's reviews from that era in the newspaper archives; the internet has all but lost any reference (Last Waterhole is on yelp, and someone mentions Ruta on Facebook, but that's about it)

hynesie08

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123946059#Comment_123946059

Yeah, Paddy just said they weren't, I'm going to believe him.

Macy0161

I wouldn't be in town that often, but location was definitely an issue even as part of the target market. If I am out, it's generally pre-gig, so time limited, the additional time just didn't work. Even taking out the likes of Porterhouse Temple Bar, Beer Temple or Pipers Corner, there's now lots of places that have one or two taps, which does the job for the couple of pints.