Great Lakes

[Craig]

Citradiction is back in their retail fridge today at 3:30.

[napoleon]

Citradiction is back in their retail fridge today at 3:30.

So for those of us without cars, is there any reasonable way to get there by transit or bike from central Toronto? Transit looks like 50 minutes each way. Biking is reasonable at just under half an hour, but Google Maps tells me to follow the Queensway which makes me a bit hesitant. Is there a bike lane?

[nickw]

Citradiction is back in their retail fridge today at 3:30.

So for those of us without cars, is there any reasonable way to get there by transit or bike from central Toronto? Transit looks like 50 minutes each way. Biking is reasonable at just under half an hour, but Google Maps tells me to follow the Queensway which makes me a bit hesitant. Is there a bike lane?

Yeah, you don't want to bike on the Queensway. Fpllow the Martin Goodman/Lakeshore path past Humber Bay Park and then use side streets to get on to Royal York Road, which has bike lanes and is the nearest N-S route that crosses the Gardiner. Check out the city's bike map: http://www1.toronto.ca/wps/portal/conte ... d60f89RCRD

[cirriform]

So for those of us without cars, is there any reasonable way to get there by transit or bike from central Toronto? Transit looks like 50 minutes each way. Biking is reasonable at just under half an hour, but Google Maps tells me to follow the Queensway which makes me a bit hesitant. Is there a bike lane?

Martin Goodman Trail > Lake Shore Boulevard (at Humber Bay Park Road) > Mimico Avenue > Royal York Road > QE Boulevard.

That will be a bit longer than half an hour though. Assuming that you are a competent road rider, Queensway isn't a terrible midday or weekend route, but drivers there tend to be nasty westbound at evening rush hour. There are bike lanes east of Humber Treatment Plant, but it's the uphill section west of Park Lawn that is stressful. Coming back, the Queensway is generally a reasonable option anytime, assuming that it fits your skill and comfort level.

[DeMarco]

Does anyone from GLB read this site, because their banker hours are terrible. I know I would make the trek more if they were open an hour later during the week, especially since traffic from don mills/eglington (work) to etobicoke is hell.

[Craig]

Does anyone from GLB read this site, because their banker hours are terrible. I know I would make the trek more if they were open an hour later during the week, especially since traffic from don mills/eglington (work) to etobicoke is hell.

They have people with accounts here. Not really sure how often they read up though.

[sprague11]

I have to commute at minimum an hour each way from outside of the city. Would love to see some longer hours (especially on weekends!) or better yet, more Saturday releases.

[Coronaeus]

Hours aside, I just wish they would actually update that list of availably beers they have now on their website. It is often two to three days out of date. I mean, they always seem to have a guy at the computer cash register when I visit. It would take no more than five minutes to update the list as things sell out.

It is a pet peeve of mine, but it really bothers me that aside from Bellwoods, I can never easily get an updated list of what is available at local breweries...

[napoleon]

It is a pet peeve of mine, but it really bothers me that aside from Bellwoods, I can never easily get an updated list of what is available at local breweries...

Exactly, especially for ones that are not conveniently located. I get frustrated that while Amsterdam occasionally has interesting stuff in their bottle shop, I never know what they have. I don't exactly want to buy a 6 pick of boneshaker and haul it back home on my bike when I can get it at the LCBO next door.

[Napalm Frog]

Junction also updates their site, but it really seems the only adequate way to find what's in stock for most breweries is Twitter. It's honestly the only reason I use Twitter these days.

[El Pinguino]

I once tweeted Indie Ale House saying I'd go there more often if they posted their current taps more often.
They replied with plenty of snark....and no current tap list....ah well, it was meant as constructive criticism!

[El Pinguino]

At least Great Lakes does psot their bottles/growlers on their site now, which they didn't before the summer? Whenever their website changed.
And they do post the "as of" date, so you know if it might be out-of-date. I am cool with that. It would seem they just updated it today for example.

[jp_jkl]

I once tweeted Indie Ale House saying I'd go there more often if they posted their current taps more often.
They replied with plenty of snark....and no current tap list....ah well, it was meant as constructive criticism!

That's disappointing to hear. I live minutes away from Indie and would stop by more often if I knew what was on tap. Luckily I live near Lansdowne Brewery as well and they've been awesome about their tap list on social media.

On the subject of GLB, sometime in the last year they altered their hours to be open 1 hour later on Fridays by closing 1 hour earlier on Saturdays. Perhaps they are willing to meet their customers halfway.

[Napalm Frog]

I once tweeted Indie Ale House saying I'd go there more often if they posted their current taps more often.
They replied with plenty of snark....and no current tap list....ah well, it was meant as constructive criticism!

I live across the street from Indie, and would go more often that I already do, too, if I knew what they had daily (especially the guest, collabs, and cask beers that they churn through so quickly). Alas, my only recourse is to keep an eye on Untappd.

[cirriform]

I live across the street from Indie, and would go more often that I already do, too, if I knew what they had daily (especially the guest, collabs, and cask beers that they churn through so quickly). Alas, my only recourse is to keep an eye on Untappd.

Or walk outside and look through their front window?

In general though, I second everyone's opinion in wishing that everyone would publish and update daily stock lists.

The cynical analysis is that the breweries that don't publish them seem to feel that they will make more money from an uninformed customer base than an informed one.

The more generous analysis would say that their first priority is their local customer base: the people that will show up to find out what they have; rather than the itinerant beer geek crowd who will only clear them out of the really good stuff, and who will do so at the expense of their dedicated customers who conceivably are the brewery's first priority in brewing both the narrow-releases and the everyday stuff.

I think that this is probably a harder balance for a lot of breweries to strike than most folks credit. I think there are (1) breweries that have no excuse for not publishing store stock (ie. Amsterdam), (2) breweries that are in the midst of expanding and figuring out how they are going to rebalance the interests of their local customers and their destination customers going forward (ie. Nickelbrook, who drive me crazy for not publishing their stock lists but about whom, grudgingly, the "more generous" analysis above is based upon), and (3) breweries where I can see exactly why they don't publish their taps list, because why would they need to? (ie. Indie, who are doing just fine with the people who will just show up, eat their food and drink their beer once a week, and who can't really grow beyond that right now anyway)

On the other hand, I will say that if a brewery decides to be consistently distributing their narrow-release beers to bars outside of their local convenience market, they do need to take responsibility for making their narrow-release retail sales accessible to buyers from that larger area. Congratulations, you've won my interest and I want to buy your narrow-release beers regularly (looking squarely at you, Nickelbrook). Now please make it possible for me to plan and put in the correct amount of effort to do that. And I do have a lot of sympathy for this issue with Great Lakes' hours, because I'm in the same boat on making it there before close any day except for the occasional Friday in good weather.