Guinness flows again at Hurley's Irish Pub after a long drought
The delivery truck pulled up in front of Hurley's Irish Pub at 9:47 a.m. Tuesday, and two workers began unloading what loyal customers at the popular Montreal drinking establishment had been thirsting after for more than a month: kegs of Guinness.
It was the bar's second and longest drought of the legendary draft beer this year, as the iconic Irish brewery has been dealing with supply issues worldwide due to the surging popularity of its alcohol-free Guinness 0 and of the social media craze surrounding the Split the G drinking game, in which people try to calibrate their first gulp so that the beer line falls exactly in the gap of the G on a branded Guinness glass.
Tuesday morning, with the goods safely chilling in Hurley's cold room, general manager Rod Applebee breathed a sigh of relief.
'It was 40 kegs and it felt good,' he said of the shipment. 'It felt good lifting them.'
And it's going to feel good pouring and serving them. For more than five weeks, Hurley's staff had to explain the situation to each customer who ordered a Guinness — the Irish pub was all out of the No. 1 Irish beer — and gently guide them toward a can of Guinness or another brand of stout. Easier said than done.
'A Guinness drinker is a Guinness drinker,' Applebee said. '(People) were getting upset. They had to switch to cans, and the cans don't cut it. They're good, but they're not Guinness on tap.'
The 40 kegs will last 'hopefully two weeks,' Applebee estimated. Next week, he plans to make another big order and to keep as much overstock as he can, just to be safe.
'With each order, I'll top up to 50 kegs,' he said. 'If I can find more (storage) space, I'll use it. Then if it does go out, I'll have a bit of a run to extend it. I hated hearing of other bars still having it. I was like, 'Man, that's just 'cause you don't sell it as quickly as us.'
Irish pubs with several locations have an advantage, said bartender Douglas Nisbit, as they can move kegs from one location to another in case of a shortage.
A giant inflatable Guinness pint was installed outside Hurley's Tuesday morning to celebrate the return of the bar's most popular brew, and the Guinness logos on the awnings over the patio could no longer be construed as false advertising.
'Guinness is us,' Applebee said. 'It's back, and hopefully for a long time.'
Sitting on the patio at lunch hour, Rebecca Hare was blissfully unaware of just how lucky she was to be sipping the first pint of Guinness to emerge from Hurley's taps in over a month, to go with her hamburger.
'I live eight hours away, between London and Windsor,' said the mom, who had brought her six-year-old son Benjamin in for an MRI.
Hare, who has an Irish harp tattooed on her inner left wrist, said: 'I love Hurley's and I love Montreal.'
She also loves Guinness, which she said is 'the only dark beer that I drink.'
She didn't know what she would have done if she had showed up a day earlier and not been able to order her favourite beer.
'I might have left,' Hare mused.
Nisbit had the honour of pouring that first pint, complete with the pause before the final top-off to make it just so.
'It was good. It was perfect,' he said. 'It poured really well, actually. I thought it might be a bit warm. If it's too warm, it foams; but it was fine.'
And all was well in the world.
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