How can fine beer establishments get away with calling their pints,
'pints' when they're really 12oz? Isn't there a law against this :-)

JaKe
Seattle

JaKe a écrit :

>How can fine beer establishments get away with calling their pints,
>'pints' when they're really 12oz? Isn't there a law against this :-)
>
Depends if the (US, 16oz) pint is a legal measure to sell beer in your
area / state.
If it is, then this would be a blatant short measure, and you should
contact your local trading standards office (or whatever that's called
in the US) .

Cheers !

Laurent


--
Warning : you may encounter French language beyond this point.

Si tu n'es pas contente, tu n'as qu'à créer une milice !!
(F'murrr)

Laurent Mousson, Berne, Switzerland

Call me picky but I get ****ed whenever I'm served a pint and it isn't an
imperial pint.


"JaKe" > wrote in message
ups.com...
> How can fine beer establishments get away with calling their pints,
> 'pints' when they're really 12oz? Isn't there a law against this :-)
>
> JaKe
> Seattle
>

The Submarine Captain wrote:

> JaKe a écrit :
>
>> How can fine beer establishments get away with calling their pints,
>> 'pints' when they're really 12oz? Isn't there a law against this :-)
>>
> Depends if the (US, 16oz) pint is a legal measure to sell beer in your
> area / state.

In much of the USA, there is no such thing as "legal" measure, and
that is true of the part of the USA in which "JaKe" lives (Washington
state).

A pub can and will call a 14-ounce mixing glass a pint. I've even
been to pubs where they mix the use of 14-ounce and 16-ounce "pints."
Such a pub will often pour a big foamy head, too, effectively
delivering a 12-ounce "pint" to an unwitting or indifferent customer.
Such customers are common in the USA, a land where truly knowledgeable
beer drinkers are still only a tiny minority among imbibers.

The best recourse is to avoid such establishments. It isn't a bad idea
to tell the management why you won't come back; some of them might care,
and some of them will look at you like you just grew a third eye.

> If it is, then this would be a blatant short measure, and you should
> contact your local trading standards office (or whatever that's called
> in the US) .

Doesn't exist. There are people who show up to enforce alcohol
regulations, of course: clean bar, toilets that aren't overflowing,
no smoking going on (illegal in several American states now, including
Washington), no drunks being served, and most important of all, no
underage minors being served. But a bar can use a "cheater" 14-ounce
pint, an American 16-ounce pint, a German half-liter glass, or a
British "Nonick" 20-ounce pint, and the bar can call any of those a
pint if it so chooses. Some bars serve both American and British pints
and let the consumer know the difference; often, such bars eschew the
"cheater" pints as well. Such bars are deserving of all the trade they
can handle. The clowns serving beer in frosted cheater pints can go to
hell and stay there.
--
dgs

Wow, very well put!

Thanks
JaKe
Seattle

On Mon, 30 Jan 2006 16:26:02 -0700, "Bill Becker" >
wrote:

>Call me picky but I get ****ed whenever I'm served a pint and it isn't an
>imperial pint.

I would think it would be easier to get ****ed if it _was_ an imperial
pint.

Dav Vandenbroucke
davanden at cox dot net

lol. Love the multiple definitions of "****ed".

"Dav Vandenbroucke" > wrote in
message ...
> On Mon, 30 Jan 2006 16:26:02 -0700, "Bill Becker" >
> wrote:
>
>>Call me picky but I get ****ed whenever I'm served a pint and it isn't an
>>imperial pint.
>
> I would think it would be easier to get ****ed if it _was_ an imperial
> pint.
>
> Dav Vandenbroucke
> davanden at cox dot net

Just like with liquor there are no rules. Some places take advantage of
this and really rip you off. Personally, I make it a point not to
patronize any place I feel is charging significantly more / giving less
alcohol as it is ALL WAY WAY WAY overpriced when you go out anyway. $4
for a domestic draft?! Give me a break. I run a business and I still
say "Give me a break!". I believe that's something like a 400-500%
markup for a glass of beer. Yeah, I think so.

" > wrote in message
ups.com...
> Just like with liquor there are no rules. Some places take advantage of
> this and really rip you off. Personally, I make it a point not to
> patronize any place I feel is charging significantly more / giving less
> alcohol as it is ALL WAY WAY WAY overpriced when you go out anyway. $4
> for a domestic draft?! Give me a break. I run a business and I still
> say "Give me a break!". I believe that's something like a 400-500%
> markup for a glass of beer. Yeah, I think so.

Well...There's the cost of the liquor license, which runs over $300,000 in
some areas right around where I live. Add on the cost of the building,
utilities, insurance (and a hefty liability rider). There's the cost of the
beer itself, keeping it cold, keeping the lines clean (which involves wasted
beer -- a LOT if the lines are long and you do it right), the bartender's
wages, advertising, accounting, taxes, some kind of legal trouble at least
every five years or so because it's just that kind of business, maintenance
on the draft system. And there's inevitably pilferage, unless you put flow
meters on your lines -- another expense -- which may well result in you
losing business to places where the bartenders do give away beers...
It's all in there. They aren't losing money at $4 a pint, but they aren't
robbing you blind, either. Figure a half barrel of domestic's $70 and you
can maybe sell 110 pints out of it; say 60 cents a glass. But that's the
keg, sitting on the curb. There's a LOT more goes into it; that license is
one hell of a big monthly nut right there.
Yeah, it's a big mark-up. It's a costly, risky business, too.

--
Lew Bryson

"GOOD or SHITE?" -- Michael Jackson, "Thriller", 1982
www.lewbryson.com

Yeah, I completely understand the overhead. They probably aren't even
making money at 4 bucks a pint. That still doesn't change how much MORE
it costs to drink out vs. at home. Sometimes I wish I didn't buy
liquor, beer, and keg beer. This way, I wouldn't know how much more I'm
paying when I go out. Liquor is probably the worst. It's unbelievable
how much more you can pay for a mere shot or two of "lower mid-shelf"
booze which they call "top shelf" when you are out. Most people that
drink out a lot wouldn't know good beer or booze if it hit 'em squa in
the face and that's probably a good thing. A local cuban restaurant
sells Mojitos with "top shelf" rum for $15. Yes, I couldn't believe it
myself. If that didn't make you sh*t your pants, wait til the bartender
pours out Bacardi as the "top shelf" rum you asked for! Then, to kick
you when you are down he pours in 7-up and throws in a mint sprig and a
twist to call it a day! LOL. You only do that once! At any rate, that
place is known for highway robbery when it comes to booze.

" > wrote
in
oups.com:

> Yeah, I completely understand the overhead. They probably
> aren't even making money at 4 bucks a pint. That still
> doesn't change how much MORE it costs to drink out vs. at
> home.

Obviously, if the (race to the) bottom line were all-important,
we would all stay home and suckle our Rochefort 8s.

The opportunity to discuss, interact, flirt, try something new -
or as Benny H. would put it: Social Intercourse - in a
pleasant (for varying definitions of "pleasant") atmosphere is
worth a premimum to most of us I would suppose. That apparently
is worth money. It's worth money to me, I know that.

IOW, I'd pay a premium to have a pint at, say, Ye Olde Kings
Head in Santa Monica or maybe he

http://www.jacksoncommasteve.com/pic...nd_2003/6.html

You?


Scott Kaczorowski
Long Beach, CA

" > wrote in message
> Yeah, I completely understand the overhead. They probably aren't even
> making money at 4 bucks a pint. That still doesn't change how much MORE
> it costs to drink out vs. at home. Sometimes I wish I didn't buy
> liquor, beer, and keg beer. This way, I wouldn't know how much more I'm
> paying when I go out. Liquor is probably the worst. It's unbelievable
> how much more you can pay for a mere shot or two of "lower mid-shelf"
> booze which they call "top shelf" when you are out. Most people that
> drink out a lot wouldn't know good beer or booze if it hit 'em squa in
> the face and that's probably a good thing. A local cuban restaurant
> sells Mojitos with "top shelf" rum for $15. Yes, I couldn't believe it
> myself. If that didn't make you sh*t your pants, wait til the bartender
> pours out Bacardi as the "top shelf" rum you asked for! Then, to kick
> you when you are down he pours in 7-up and throws in a mint sprig and a
> twist to call it a day! LOL. You only do that once! At any rate, that
> place is known for highway robbery when it comes to booze.

Oh, hey, LIQUOR, that's another matter. Easy to inventory, lasts practically
forever, never breaks anyone's foot...the markup on liquor should make those
guys blush themselves to death.

--
Lew Bryson

"GOOD or SHITE?" -- Michael Jackson, "Thriller", 1982
www.lewbryson.com

" > wrote in message
oups.com...

> Yeah, I completely understand the overhead. They probably aren't even
> making money at 4 bucks a pint.

Depends on where they're at. Des Moines, Iowa, they're probably making
plenty (beer is a profit center, food breaks even at most restaurants and
brewpubs). In New York, they're losing it by buckets.

> That still doesn't change how much MORE
> it costs to drink out vs. at home.

Well, duh. Does it strike you by surprise or seem unfair that food costs
more when you eat out than cook it yourself? That anyone should be surprised
by this, or complain about it, is baffling.

> Sometimes I wish I didn't buy
> liquor, beer, and keg beer. This way, I wouldn't know how much more I'm
> paying when I go out.

Don't buy any food, either. After all, that three-egg omelet costs as much
as a couple dozen eggs you'd buy yourself.

-Steve