Kids in Taprooms?

I take my 8 year old daughter to Hill Farmstead, Alchemist, Burlington Beer Co, Fiddlehead and more. She has fun time with me and my wife as a family. She also is seeing that alcohol is a craft and to be savored and appreciated. For me, I'm really happy we're in Vermont and have access to many tasting rooms like this. I see a good deal of other kids and I always smile when I do.

 

It is... I get that some people find breweries an adult place. Many are really geared towards families and family oriented fun. I asked months ago about Asheville options with kids and a few felt kids had no place at all. Most felt Asheville a family friendly city and most breweries fine. turns out Sierra Nevada is a family fun zone with many cornhole games, bocce ball, and a sandpit for kids. At Wicked Weed we ate and had a drink or two outside. We met a couple of 20ish aged women with a new puppy that spoke with my daughter who is 8 for an hour about dogs and dog training and horse back riding , etc. She loved it and had a great time. So that place was perfect as well. I do not go to restaurants or breweries late though with kids. I don't take them to beer releases. I don't go to places with kids that are not family oriented or at least have a restaurant or kid friendly games and fun things to do. My wife drinks very little, so she often drives us home if I have more than a beer as well just to qualify.

 

My first question would be: Then why are you here? And the second would be a direct answer to the end of your post in that what I posted was a direct response to that. Most people of an older generation (my mother) grew up with that exact perception, and it was great to be able for her to see that there are now many places that to the contrary, are very family and kid friendly. Guess your post really confused me as all the reasons and arguments you listed are exactly why most people are here and I think this kind of forum is exactly what has a hand in changing peoples perceptions of establishments that happen to serve beer cannot be family friendly.

 

I briefly worked to a small brewery\taproom where the owner and his friends let their kids around 3-4 years old run around and play. It was like a daycare/brewery which was the worst part of the job. It's pretty bad (and a bit contradictory in a way) when you don't like working at a brewery because of the loud, obnoxious kids.

 

Now I'm the one confused. I honestly can't tell what your take on my post was, but l'll just say that I enjoyed the story in your first post very much, and my intention was to express surprise that someone might find circumstances like the one in your story undesirable.

 

I took mine to a brewery today. They don't care, as long as they aren't being annoying... but I guess that goes for adults too. You'd probably get dirty looks if you were drinking several beers while you had your kid with you, or if you were out late with them at a brewery. Just use common sense and you'll be ok.

 

depends on the place, the kids, the parents and the time of day. It also depends on how the parents respond to tired cranky kids (like one parent leave and go for a walk).

 

Well that explains it. I was just very confused as you are upbeat and informative and with that list you put up then what you said I took it you were becoming a bit "put off" with the attitudes of folks here. I agree there are some puffed up personalities around these parts but I also think there are a lot of good people here
(yourself included) who really enjoy the craft beer scene and what it has become (or is becoming). Sorry to come across a bit sour. After reading it I admit I did sound a bit dickish.
Again thank you for clarifying as that post did not sound like you at all! But I got it now!

 

I think it's ok to have kids in taprooms. I just think the kids should be behaved and not be little monsters.

 

This. And that there seems to be an affinity between alcohol or, even, the near proximity to alcohol, and foul language.

You get a group of four or five twenty-something guys f-ing this and f-ing that totally unconcerned that right next to them is a couple with a ten year-old. Of course, a few weeks ago I was standing in line at a brewery and the kid in question was lying on his belly in the gravel parking lot buiding a tower out of crushed cigarette butts which, I think, warranted dope-slaps all around.

I try not to worry too much about what other people to with their kids even though I know that twenty years down the road those kids are supposed to be the hard-working, responsible taxpayers subsidizing my retirement, not worthless, alcoholic drags on society. If I see families at a place like, for example, Jack's Abby which is a sit-down German beer hall with a full menu and lots of other families, I don't flinch. But there are other venues, such as breweries in industrial parks with tasting rooms that don't serve food where, clearly, the only reason for bringing your kids is because you couldn't get a babysitter.

Also, I'd like to completely endorse the notion that, just because you can do something, doesn't mean that you should.

 

Finish the story, man... how high did the tower of cig butts get?

 

Kids and dogs make a taproom feel like home (in a good way).

 

There's a certain irony in you castigating the selfishness of others without recognizing that everything you're saying could just as easily be understood as selfishness by those on the other side of this debate. It isn't that taprooms are anybody's "personal safe space," but they are traditionally adult spaces. That it is more convenient for you to impose on others than either hire a babysitter or make a personal sacrifice (which is a cornerstone of proper parenting) by having to do without a particular form of adult recreation you enjoy, is decidedly selfish. "Sometimes the kids need to come along," you say? Alright, but work circumstances aside, when is there ever a "need" to visit a brewery? Never. So you're putting your enjoyment over that of other patrons, and no doubt you kids as they get older and don't find watching daddy drink for a few hours sufficiently stimulating. But who needs self-awareness when you can lash out at others?

 

To be fair, I will say that I don't have kids and am not sure where I stand on the issue.

That said (on a sort of related tangent), I really am rubbed the wrong way by parents bringing young kids to wait in line for special releases that often involve hours in the sun or in the winter roughish conditions at sometimes ungodly hours.

 

If the brewery does not offer the option of hosting a <well behaved, non-confrontational> canine, then I would not enjoy a small human causing a disruption, as they cannot share in the same enjoyment as its chaperones.

Essentially, if parents want to visit a brewery then a babysitter is the best option...God forbid they get stopped for a traffic violation and get pegged with a DUI!

 

I would say no. I am a parent of two small kids. I will take them out to eat occasionally for breakfast or lunch. I don't take them to bars or brew pubs out of respect for the parents like myself, who given the rare occasion to go out with the wife while the kids are being watched by my folks, don't like to have to listen to other peoples children be kids. If that makes me a bit of a dick well then so be it. Kids and rooms full of half drunk adults trying to relax don't mix. If you want to take a toddler out to eat go to chuck-e-cheese. The Bar vibe doesn't improve with children. If you don't believe me wait until the first time you and your wife get to go out without the kid and get sabotaged by someone else's kid being snotty at the next table.

 

Guys! It depends on the venue, and circumstances like time of day! That simple

 

One of the many things I love about the craft beer culture is the family friendly atmosphere at breweries and tap rooms (well, most anyway). Just a couple things though that I really would rather not see: Kids sitting at the bar, and Moms or Dads sitting at the bar holding babies in diapers sitting on the bar. And, yeah I've changed a bunch of diapers so I know first hand what can and frequently does happen.

 

What I'm finding frustrating is some people's insistence that consuming beer at a brewery (no/minimal food) is specifically an "adult activity." Obviously there's a degree of case dependency, but there are a handful of places around me that are essentially beer cafes or in one case, a public living room that happens to brew and serve beer. There's nothing "adult" about it, other than the legal designation.

As far as I'm concerned, this is a huge part of the problem America has with alcohol in general. How is drinking at a brewery/taproom any more "adult" than drinking at home? Because the focus is beer? So what. Demonstrate that you can go drink outside the home in moderation. It's the adult thing to do. Demonstrate that beer isn't reserved for Friday-Saturday nights in servings of at least three. Demonstrate that beer is a beverage. A beverage that can have consequences, but that ultimately, it is just a beverage.

 

It is in my state. I'm pretty sure it is in Massachusetts, too.