How many taps is too many?

This is being used here. Looks like an amazing system. Envious.

 

the bar i work at has 30. happy hour is from 4-7. half are $2, half are $3. no problem with freshness here... it is the best happy hour in town

 

I moved here just a bit after they opened. Thanks for trading me your spot

 

Glad to hear theres somebody fighting the good fight in EL. It's a keystine light, labatt town for the most part

 

My favorite places these days have about 12 well-selected taps (variety of styles as well as local/national ratio) that rotate quickly, and are also fairly low-key (not sure there's a correlation, there, but it does make for a nice experience).

 

And I'll bet that if there is a TV its kept on mute most of the time.

 

Sure, but I actually don't think I've seen a TV in a bar with the sound on in a while. One place I'm thinking of doesn't even have one.

 

Carefully curated, 8 taps is probably enough, but I would feel "safe" ordering anything at a bar with under 30, no questions asked.

I've had 6 month old double jack out of a keg that tasted amazing so I'm usually not too worried about the age of cold and light protected kegs, within reason of course.

 

I'm assuming that was The Mayor. Awesome place with 100 rotating taps and always has some amazing beers available. One of the few places I've had a Pliny and followed it with a Tart of Darkness and then Ten Fidy.

 

Truly depends on traffic at your joint.

 

You guessed it! The Mayor was the one place I didn't get to visit on my stay there. I really wish I could've witnessed it. I was at various breweries all week.

 

It is a prime example of how to do a large tap establishment. Did you make it to Choice City Butcher while you were there? Top rate meats and sandwiches with a select tap list of only very good beer. Kind of the opposite idea, but again no issue with turning kegs.

What breweries did you get to visit in FoCo?

 

Gingerman in NYC has 70 plus bottles plus casks and 2 beer engines. Kegs last only a couple days there. Always fresh and delicious.

 

I can't imagine trying to maintain and monitor 125 taps. I'd say 20 or so taps gives as much flexibility that would be reasonable. Don't carry bmc crap, that stuff is bottles only. So 20 or so in a lot.

 

Choice City is my go to.

 

http://www.barrelhouse101.com

 

Yes. A well chosen set of beers can be easily done with 15 taps. No matter how big a place is or how much business that they might do, kegs become a hindrance, pieces of them, sometimes forgotten and they may become a total loss. I've seen reputable places sell less than good beer. Overkill with numbers never supplants quality selection and delivery to the customer.

 

Im the beverage director at a bar with 90 beers on tap and the GM and I both understand the nature of time sensitivity and we have a great system in place to not have bad beer on tap (we won't serve beer that we feel has off flavors in it) so as long as it's run correctly I don't see a problem with even more than that.

 

How frequently do you clean your beer lines? Do you clean them yourself or do you contract it out to a beer cleaning vendor?

Cheers!

 

It depends on turnover. As long as the beer isn't sitting in a keg for months and months on end then I'm OK with 60+ taps. Quality over quantity is always most important.