Fraudulent Taps?

I've had this happen to me once, and it was a line mixup. Little dive bar was serving 32oz draft PBR's for $2, but it was without a doubt SN Pale Ale coming out of the tap. After the first one I told them and they fixed it, but continued to serve me enormous $2 SN's the rest of the night

My guess is it was either an old keg they didn't want to dump or weren't paying attention to, or it was probably accidental tap line mismatch. I would imagine though that you'd be right as far as legality goes if a place did that on purpose, but if someone is doing that with a well-known beer it's only a matter of time before someone comes in a recognizes that is isn't what they say it is so I don't know that the risk would really be worth the reward.

 

Exactly what I was going to say. From experience, unless the kegs were placed in the cooler improperly when delivered, the chance of crossed lines is minimal unless the cooler is drastically undersized.

 

IIRC, that was intentional. I believe the "regulars" were informed about it ahead of time.

 

Along with Celebration, Nugget Nectar and anything else someone hasn't tasted in a year.

 

I've worked in various stages of the alcohol industry for over 25 years, I don't know about California, but in Mass, they will sell Busch kegs as Bud light, Smirnoff vodka as Absolut. Most local watering holes will and do try to cut corners as much as possible to make as much profit as possible. I can't imagine that it doesn't run into higher craft beers section either. They as all do blame someone else if caught. It has been going on forever, and will continue to as long as there are sleezy people in charge of bars.

 

http://insidescoopsf.sfgate.com/blo...ife-allows-its-regulars-to-actually-enjoy-it/

 

I'd posted about an experience a while back with a bona fide line cross up (IPA was poured from a tap offering a single). If the cooler has spaghetti for lines due to 20 -30 or more taps and they are slam busy and hefting empties around full backup kegs takes attention away from the task at hand (or the bar backs lean towards inexperienced), than I'd say it's a miracle this doesn't occur more often.

 

Went to a bar my buddy bartends (only works on Sundays) @ and he tells me to order a Stone IPA. I say why? I can drink that anywhere. He says someone early in the week tapped a Stone Enjoy By as a regular IPA! That is a 93$ difference on cost of keg and were sold as pints not 10-12 oz pours. They took a loss on that keg.

 

And I was at Beer Mongers when I visited Portland last October. Great place. Small but great. Got there pretty close to opening so it was empty. As he was checking inventory and I was enjoying a habenero Sculpin, I struck up a conversation with the bartender and he recommended I go across the street to Apex to try some Barley Brown. Since I'd never heard of Barley Brown, I told him I didn't like brown ales. He didn't hold it against me and told me the beer was Pallet Jack IPA. Delicious and a nice gesture on his part.

As far as I'm concerned, mislabeling a rare beer is a great way to take care of regulars [and anyone else who has the brains to figure out what they were doing charging $7 for a 12 oz. Miller.

 

I have an account in my market that sells Timmermans Framboise with a Lindemans Framboise tap handle.

 

We had a permanent handle for one of our beers at an establishment, one day they quit ordering. Find out 3 months later they still had us on the menu, and when people ordered our beer they served them the cheap alternative they were buying. So disgusting, and potentially so damaging to our brand.

 

At my favorite bar my favorite server will often bring me a flight of what she and the bar tender think I haven't had. A few weeks ago out of 7 beers, 3 of them - a Deschutes, a Victory, and a Bells - all were indistinguishable and tasted vegetal - like someone dumped a can of canned green bean juice into the beers. Bad beer lines. Unfortunately, this happens way more than it should.

 

I worked in the industry many years ago and I suppose very little has changed. However, at the time I was involved, that type of stuff was few and far between and mostly at cut-rate bars and for special events like New Year's Eve, etc. - but never for regular customers.

 

Do I think people may lie in order to profit?

Yes.

Yes, I do.

Yes, I do indeed.

 

customers in the bar shouldn't have to know whether or not the beer is seasonal. somebody at that bar dropped the ball big time.

 

An out of town restaurant chain just came to Columbus and I ordered a CBC Bodhi like most upstanding locals would do. Turns out it was Miller Lite...pretty easy to tell IMO

The manager was pouring me other samples to figure out what they were

 

Yep, it was certainly different this year. Still excellent, but last year's had the most citrusy, resinous nose of any IPA I've ever smelled and the malt backbone was minimal. This year's nose, while still great, was dialed back a bit in the citrusy, "catty" department and there was a noticeable increase in malt content. I'll still buy a 4-pack every year though. Love the shit out of that beer. And yeah OP, that was an old keg you had. Either they waited way too long to tap it or it just didn't sell for some reason (I'm thinking it was the former since it's a fantastic IPA).

 

I had this happen on New Years, I ordered a Port City Porter at a bar here in DC and the gal brought me what was clearly an Amber. She was nice about it but she said she got the right beer. She went back to the bar and then brought me back the Porter when she realized she was wrong.

 

Probably should find a new favorite bar...