The Bar Towel

I was just speaking to Mark (one of the owners and general manager) and he mentioned they have lined up about 97 of the planned 100 taps. Besides the usual Molbatt and european selections, he did mention that they would have quite a few craft/micros and mentioned Mill St., Church Key, Great Lakes, Niagra's Best, Neustadt and some more that I can't remember .

He seemed to welcome input as to what micro's people would like to see there so if anyone who might frequent the area may want to drop them a line. As of right now, the opening is scheduled for Oct 25th or 26th.

I may be missing something here, but where is this place going to be located?

Steve-E wrote:... 97 of the planned 100 taps.

Not to be a doubter but that sounds like a recipe for a lot of stale beer to me.

Steve Spong wrote:I may be missing something here, but where is this place going to be located?

It's in Mississauga at the Sussex Centre (I believe where Dick's Last Resort was). It was mentioned on the main page, under the September 17th posting

JerCraigs wrote:

Steve-E wrote:... 97 of the planned 100 taps.

Not to be a doubter but that sounds like a recipe for a lot of stale beer to me.

I agree, but maybe they're all 20's

I hate to say it but Mississauga and points just west of Toronto are a wasteland when it comes to good beer and a 100 tap establishment is going to have a tough time of it. I think back to the Rack 'n Tap in Brampton and their 100+ bottle selection...we received one order from them and never heard from them again. I wish these guys well but they better have deep pockets.

Aren't all points in Ontario outside of Toronto beer wastelands?

I will go, and bring others, to show some support for the craft scene, though its not convenient

It just keeps raising the question for me...why no new 20+ micro tap pubs in DOWNTOWN GTA??? Why no multitude of decent brew pubs?

What's wrong with this city when places open in suburbias like Mississauga and Whitby (G.Biersch) when there's little to no market out there for micros and/or more that 20 taps? I'm guessing the only way this place survives long term is if 70-80% of those taps are European, Canadian and American macros that you can get everywhere else.

It's just a guess on my part, but could it be because of real estate/lease costs downtown Toronto v. elsewhere?

Given the same bar setup in downtown Toronto versus most other places I'd bet that you could afford to run it longer in the suburbs than downtown. Of course, if you locate outside of downtown and get no business then that assumption doesn't mean a whole lot.

Location and freshness of beer aside, the biggest argument I can see against a 100 tap bar is the lack of interesting drafts in Ontario. I mean, really, after you cover the major domestics and imports, you've got what, 70-75 taps left to fill? With what?

Could be interesting - although seeing as how I've already had a tough time getting used to a commute to York University, I doubt I'd be trekking to Mississauga any time soon. It's a great idea though - although I'd prefer it at Yonge and Dundas or someplace similarly downtown, as opposed to in the boonies.

As a native of Mississauga, although I'm over at Winston Churchill / QEW area, as opposed to Hurontario / Burnhamthorpe where this place will be located, I'm absolutely THRILLED to bits that I might actually be able to get a decent pint in this city!

I'm cautiously optimistic, but some comments so far are definitely very good questions:

- How will they keep the beer fresh?
- How will they fill up 100 taps, I've tried to come up with a list just for curiosity sake, trying to balance off your typical sports bar / pub fare, imports, and a healthy selection of local craft beer...

Anyway, check this out - imagine walking into a place and having a selection like this: (Apologies in advance for any typos, it's 1:30am...)

Amsterdam Blonde
Amsterdam Framboise
Bass
Bavaria
Becks
Bellevue Kriek
Big Rock Grasshopper
Black Label
Black Oak Nut Brown
Black Oak Pale Ale
Blue
Blue Light
Boddingtons
Brahma
Brickman Amber
Brickman Pilsner
Bud
Bud Light
Caledonia 80/-
Cameron's Auburn
Canadian
Carlsberg
Carlsberg Light
Church Key Holy Smoke
Coors Light
Corona
Creemore
Denison's Weiss
Durham XXX
Fosters
Fullers London Pride
Grolsch
Guinness
Harp
Heineken
Hoegarden
Keith's
Kilkenny
King Pilsner
KLB Raspberry Wheat
Kokanee
Labatt 50
Labatt Sterling
Leffe Blonde
Maudite
MGD
Mill St. Coffee Porter
Mill St. Stock Ale
Mill St. Tankhouse
Molson Dry
Moosehead
Neustadt Lager
Newcastle Brown
Niagara Falls Gritstone
Niagara's Best Blonde
Old Credit Pale Pilsner
Red Stripe
Rickards Pale
Rickards Red
Robert Simpsons Confed.
Sam Adams Boston Lager
Sgt. Majors IPA
Sleemans Clear
Sleemans Cream Ale
Sleemans Honey Brown
Smithwicks
Steamwhistle
Stella Artois
Stratford Pilsner
Tennents Lager
Tetley's
Trafalgar Celtic Ale
Tuborg
Upper Canada Dark
Upper Canada Lager
Upper Canada Wheat
Waterloo Dark
Wellington - Arkell's
Wellington - Imperial Stout

Guess What? That still only comes to 79, and I had to use the Beer Store website for help! Ok, I could stick in every brand from every OCB, but realistically that won't happen... Anyway, not sure what my point was, but certainly a place like this deserves our support doesn't it?? (At least until they screw up!!)

I'm as unlikely to support this bar with regular visits (being that I live downtown) as you are to support a bar in Hamilton. I'll visit, as a novelty, but I think it'll be up to the "locals" to keep this place afloat. Sadly proximity does have something to do with support...I'm not going to drive an hour to only have a pint (no D&D) so that means I have to get there via transit both ways...hassle. If they had offerings from Stone, Victory, Bells etc. in amongst the local micros...that'd be a different story. But we all know that ain't gonna happen.

Regarding the 100 taps...my guess is you'll see repeats for the most popular brands. Any bar that has so many taps would have to have either 1) a bar at least 60 feet long or 2) two of more bars in different parts of the floorspace. Either way you'd have to expect at least three bartenders working at any given time serving mostly waitresses for table service...in that event it makes sense to have more than one tap of, say, Molson Canadian (come on, it's Mississauga!) in order to prevent service getting backed up. I just don't see them having 100 taps with 100 different brands...very unlikely and not really practical.

So I guess we'll wait and see. I hope they have an amazing selection AND the local community supports that diversity...but there are some serious and legitimate issues they'll have to get past.

Hey fellow bartowelers, I am somewhat familiar with the idea behind this new place. I am a friend of the woman who will be the manager of this new place. She currently has been managing a place called Ten, a fairly apscale steakhouse/bar at Lakeshore/Hurontario. Over the summer, she asked me for a short list of roughly 20 quality local beers that they should persue to have at this new establishment. I too thought the idea of 100 taps would be extremely difficult to maintain as the turnover of quality micro beer would be too slow based on the massive selection. In any event, I applauded the ambitious idea, especially since there is VERY few good places for beer in Mississauga area. I e-mailed her a list of beers from Denisons, Black Oak, Mill Street, Church Key, County Durham, Scotch Irish, McAuslan, Wellington, Fullers, King, Camerons etc. It seems that she has contacted a good number if not most of these breweries and will have many of these on tap. I know they will also have many generic macro beers as well. I think the length of the bar will be so long that there will be duplicates on many beers. Anyways, hopefully that paints a little more of a picture.