Possibly a thread elsewhere already but
Temple Bar has always been overpriced but €9 for a pint is pretty insane.
Roughly 90 pints per keg × 9 = 1800 per keg they must be making a pretty penny. I know rents, insurance, staff etc
Locally i paid €4.90 for a pint of Birra Moretti
So would or do you pay €9 a pint..
I was in Cork about a month ago, I dont drink Heineken but wasnt in the mood for a stout. Got a heineken in the corner house for 6€ went right next door to Sin E and it was 6.90, the **** is that about
I found an old screenshot of a receipt from 2013. 7 quid for Woodford Reserve. Ah, the good old days:-)
Pint Sam Adams €11 seems expensive?
That's the price for 2 pints which was a bit expensive 12 years ago.
At least they ordered a bit of soakage for all that booze 🙂
Is it not for 2?
Oops! 🤗
€6.90 is about average in Cork city. You did well getting one for €6
I was contracting at the time. It was "networking".
was it just two people? Pint and a chaser style I am imagining
3 people.
I like your style of doing business.
I hope you got the gig 🙂
The guts of 200 quid on a Wednesday, sadly, those days are gone:-)
5.50 was steep enough for a pint in a craft bar even then; I'm pretty sure I was paying 4.50 - 4.00 with a Beoir discount token - for Galway Bay pints at the time, or even later.
Pint prices took a looong time to go back up after the crash, and often fell in the early days of it, e.g. there was a duty cut that was later reversed and a lot of pubs never put it back on, and a lot ate the 21>23% VAT change
Sin E is owned by a much smaller rival brewery. It's primarily about selling their own beer and they only stock a few of the well knowns for people who only drink the major brands.
Paid 8.40 for a Peroni in the Maldron Tallaght last Friday, never again
Peroni is always on the high end and so are hotel bars. Put the 2 together and you get 8.40.
The beer in the Maldron Tallaght is shocking.
nowhere else to go before a game, might get a can from Lidl next time 😀
I've blown the €5 Guinness trumpet in the Lark Inn in D8 before, was in with my dad last weekend and he had a Heineken for only €5.50. Thought it was only the Guinness that was on offer there, and they had something like Carling/Tuborg etc. that was the cheap lager option.
Heineken €8.40 in McDaids Harry street
In 2025, in the suburbs of Dublin, pints of beer are being sold in some pubs for €2.10, profitably.
So when you see pints in pubs for 6.00 / 7.00 / 8.00, some or all of the following are happening:
(1) the brewer has higher costs, and/or is taking a much higher gross margin
(2) the brewer's net margin is much higher
(3) the pub doesn't have scale, so its prices must be higher
(4) the pub has pricing power, and uses this to earn higher net margins
(5) the customers are price inelastic, and willing-to-pay higher prices
Who is selling a pint for 2.10, and what's the beer?
Three JD Wetherspoon pubs in the suburbs of Dublin: Swords, Blanch, Dún Laoghaire
Pints of cask beer at prices from €2.05 upwards.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/Ua1EZZrikh87tR1m9
Was out in Temple Bar and Dame Street during the week. Pints ranged from 9.90 to €5 in disanddat just off Dame Street. Live music, lovely spot and half the price almost
Cask isn't really comparable to other draught but even going like for like it's 2.95 and as you say above it can be any number if things to explain the differences in prices.
My point is that pints of beer can be sold, profitably, at €2.05 in 2025. (€2.70 in central Dublin)
When you hear publicans complaining, always bear this in mind.
When the VFI call for excise duty to be reduced, they never mention the elephant in the room which is the cost charged to them by Diageo and Heineken.
They call for the State to reduce excise duty, instead of themselves trying to get better deals from their suppliers.
And when publicans do co-operate to brew their own beer (e.g. Changing Times), instead of passing on the savings to the customer, like JD Wetherspoon do, Changing Times refused to do this, and captured that value as extra profit for themselves.
few of us meet for gigs and stuff regularly in Dublin cc, and i have to say ive passed up on the last few gigs and meet ups. we were all debating the last time about beer prices in the city, 7.60 did it for me, i am out. might be biting of my nose etc…i dont care. suburb pubs close to us, you are still around 6+/7.00 - madness.
this really is a case of who will blink first with diageo and pubs etc. government are piling us into debt that will bring us down, they dont care and need the taxes.
when the pubs are gone, the likes off diageo and publicans etc will blame the consumer - yeah nice one lads. Restaurants will do the same.
its a topic on everyone's lips, but im seeing little from anyone in the industry trying to save their own bacon ?
re wetherspoons, id have no issue boozing in one of their pubs if it were close, or handy to get to. the only one ive been in is the one on camden st - not bad, but it feels like a hotel lobby - its too noisey / echoe-y ? downstairs is like a fast food seating setup, not for me. if they smartened it up like i pub id be there.
Pubs in Dublin are still very busy. There are more than enough people happy to pay those prices.
Unless there is a tipping point where consumers say no, I dont think there will be a reversal in prices.
If/when the airport cap is removed, the tourist numbers will increase again and this will swell the hospitality industry in Dublin further.
We are still seeing plenty of new hotels opening each year, the problem at the moment is that tourists cant get to Dublin because of the passenger cap.
Wetherspoons gets their kegs for a lot cheaper than the breweries that Irish drinkers insist on supporting sell to Irish publicans.
Stop drinking Diageo/Heineken products and they'll cut their wholesale prices.
There's some very cheap, known name European lagers available from alternative suppliers if publicans could justify dropping the big boys taps - but they can't as people keep drinking them! Becks and Veltins are both frequently fiver pints still.
"Beer" can't be sold for that price. Try cask ale in a normal Irish pub would be literally pouring money down the sink when nobody buys it. And that's after the huge retrofit to your cellar.
Changing Times is sadly brewed to as you say "price inelastic" customers. Hopefully someone comes along with a version that does what you hoped because you are right that it's the big breweries causing much of the problem.
