Now It's Serious: Shrink Ray Hits Beer
Although we've been covering the unpleasant phenomenon of the grocery shrink ray for a while, we've been slightly relieved that the shrinking products were things like soap, gum, and orange juice—not crucial staples of our existence. Not anymore, according to the Wall Street Journal: Bars and restaurants are shrinking their beers. The horror!
According to the Journal, some establishments are subtly reducing their "pint" glasses to 14 ounces, rather than the full 16 ounces that comprise a pint, either by using smaller glasses or using heavy-bottomed pint glasses (called "falsies") that have reduced capacity. Other bars are giving patrons extra head on their pours in order to fill up the glass. When confronted, restaurateurs were alarmingly frank: A representative for Hooters (which, really, should understand that its patrons value size) explained, "We can get 20 more beers out of a keg that way." Another defended the decision to switch to the 14 ounce glasses: "Someone who comes in and wants a beer doesn't want a huge glass. Fourteen ounces is enough." As a connoisseur of forties, mug nights, and gallon daiquiri Sundays, we must stress how wrongheaded a sentiment that is. Some pint fans have begun outing the faux-pint establishments and the Oregon legislature is considering having the state agriculture department monitor violations, but in the meantime, might we suggest a flask?
A Pint-Size Problem (Thanks to Gwen!)
(Photo: Getty)
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In Europe, the glasses have measuring lines on them to show you haven't been underserved. I thought it was silly. Now I'm not so sure.
Bring your own pint glass -- drink -- repeat
they crossed the line!
Great, I forsee dire consequences at bars with heavy drinkers looking for blood becuase they thinked they were underserved when they didn't realize that is the new size.
If I used to be paying for 16 ounces and now I'm getting 14, I want to pay less or I'm going to be an angry half-drunk and poor man!
Outrageous. Beer in a restaurant isn't cheap to begin with. It really makes no sense how they can justify a price increase like this.
@Applekid: Because the gov't regulates the manufacturer of pint glasses, and the sale of beer in an unregulated glass (presumably in bars) is illegal.
This isn't illegal? A pint is a pint and I expect to get just that when I order one.
...we wanted to be more like europe! smaller everything for the same price!!!!
Yeah, considering sometimes I pay $4.00 for a pint of Sam Adams when $7.00 gets me a six pack... the prices are already high enough.
Oh man, that means I gotta drink more before I go out and drive to the bar with my 3 year old son.
@no.no.notorious: Actually they serve imperial pints in England...LARGER than their American counterpart...not sure if that extends to the rest of Europe but still...
The U.S. needs a law like the British Weights and Measures Act. Greatest law ever invented, barely edging out the Magna Carta and the U.S. Constitution.
ok, that's it. i can take smaller country crock, smaller jimmy dean - hell, i promise i won't even bitch about the smaller cadbury eggs anymore.
but this? i think walter said it best: "i'm talking about drawing a line in the sand, dude. across this line you do not..."
where's my gun?
Pfft. Its gone on for years with beer. Didnt you ever wonder why the UK Pint is larger than the US Pint? =P
seriously though imo bigger 'portions' is leading to bigger appetites, bigger stomachs and fatter people. Im happy to let the shrink ray roll on.
The shrink ray has more to do with manufacturing energy costs (fuel, electricity) than with anything else. Those costs go up, package and content sizes get reduced. Quite often, a price increase also accompanies this.
Quite simply, companies want the same or better profits, so they pass the buck onto you, the consumer by making smaller product that costs more. They can now ship more packages per truck trailer than previously and you end up paying the difference.
As an Oregon resident, I would vote for a keeping a pint at 16 ounces. If the feds won't hold up a standard then its up to the states.
As someone who regularly enjoys several pints of Guinness over the weekends with friends, THE SKY HAS FALLEN! It's time to panic...
OK, not really. The local pub we go to prides themselves with real pint glasses and the owner is an Irishman who would probably kill anyone who sold a pint in a non-pint glass.
This actually needs some explanation. Beer in Supermarkets in Utah is weak, 3 points instead of the normal 6 points of alchohol. It's the religious influence, and a pain in the ass. Now to me it makes no sense. If you've got alchohol, you've got alchohol. So why 3 instead of 6? You know a drunk's just going to drink twice as many beers to get drunk, so you not only have a drunk on your hands, you have a drunk who's fat and gross. There's nothing worse.
Also, beer sucks, and shots will never be less then one ounce.
I noticed this trend with a few bars in St Paul couple of weekends ago during the Grand Old Days festival. Not only were the servings smaller, the prices were jacked up too.
The upside to that is, we can now drink more glasses of beer at the bars.
Well, are they posting a sign that says "At Hooters a 16-ounce pint is 14 ounces"??
More to the point, are they posting a sign that says "At Hooters, a D-cup is really a B-cup"??
I'm still pissed that some bars serve 16 oz "pints" instead of 20's. @ninjatoddler:
Dude, Grand Old Day, what did you expect. You're on the wrong side of the river anyways, Mississippi to St. Croix is a no-man's-land.
@Overheal: You're right! Getting less for your money (ergo paying more for your product) is a great thing!
henry's tavern already has ridiculously expensive beers, this article just sealed it for me, i'm never going back.
I actually just emailed the North Carolina Standards Division a few minutes before reading this post. I asked for a pint at the Carolina Beer Company at CLT (the Charlotte airport) a few days ago. I was offered a "large" instead, though the waitress didn't know how many ounces it actually was. I said I'd just have a pint, and asked to make sure that it was indeed 16oz of beer, to which I was told "so, a small?" I asked again, "so a small is a pint, 16oz, right?" She said "yeah, that sounds right." I got served what was obviously 14oz of beer with one of those super-thick glass bottoms to make you feel like you're actually drinking out of a pint glass.
Under-pours, obvious over-heading, etc, just annoy me. I think the most annoying, though was at a Great Lakes Brewing Company-affiliated bar at CLE. They served beer as 12oz or 23oz. I wanted a pint. Not 12oz, not 23oz. They had a ton of pint glasses along the shelf. I asked for a pint, pointing to the pint glass, and was told "we don't serve beer in those." I finally got the bartender to pour me a pint, in a pint glass, and just charge me for 23oz (fair enough if they don't normally serve that size; that's just how much I wanted to drink at that point.)
This is actually old news.
Most bars have been using "American" pint glasses, which are 14 oz, for years. (take one of the glasses you've stolen/bought from your favorite bar, and measure for proof.) True pints mainly have been served at British/Irish themed pubs and costlier connoisseur establishments. Guess most folks didn't know that that those glasses with the bar's logo on them have been cheating them of 2oz per glass for quite a long while...
As for more head in the pour... shame on them!
I like the logic of people who come in for a pint not wanting a pint, but wanting 7/8 of a pint. And I'm sure that no one ever orders two pints. Because clearly they don't want a pint to begin with, so getting 1 and 3/4 pints is just ridiculous!
16 oz of any drink isn't that much. They're trying to say that having a can of beer and a half isn't what consumers want.
oh noes they be stealin mah beer!
The solution? Four words: Taco Mac Passport Club
20 ounces of beer for the price of 16.
@magdelane:
Sorry, but "American" pint glasses are indeed 16 oz, and "most bars" do not use 14oz versions. An Imperial pint is more like 19oz. You'll often see them looking like American 16oz pint glasses, but with a bulge near the top. The 14oz glasses are a new thing. Now, you can easily tell them due to the thick bottom. However, they'll probably soon start making them slightly narrower, so they don't have the tell-tale thick bottom nor are shorter. I have dozens of pint glasses as I collect them, and I'd like to think that I could tell the difference. I have yet to see an American 14oz glass that's been narrowed or anything of the sort to more easily masquerade as a pint glass; they just all have that extra-thick bottom. I don't know what bars you go to, but I certainly have found them to be the exception rather than the rule.
"Someone who comes in and wants a beer doesn't want a huge glass. Fourteen ounces is enough."
By the same logic I guess when I pay for the 14 oz. beer, the owner wouldn't really want $4.00 for the "pint", $3.00 is enough...
Watch as industry flacks begin spinning that a pint is actually a "pint", a colloquial term first popularized by Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins. As in, "Pint whare the bird is, luv."
No, I haven't seen Mary Poppins, but I've read Sandman, and if Death loves Dick's Cockney accent, that's well and good for me. I mean, she's Death.
...To be followed by Big Oil claiming that a gallon is actually a "gallon".
Oh, and I just actually read the article and noticed that they quoted Jason Alström of beeradvocate.com. The Alström Brothers are awesome, as are the BeerAdvocate beer festivals that they host in Boston.
an Imperial pint is 20oz not "about 19" - and in the UK they made pubs switch from pint glasses to oversized glasses marked with a line because froth doesn't count.
...ok that's it. hell has frozen over. a pint is a pint. don't sell me something that doesn't measure up :(
@jpp123:
I think there may be some confusion here, as you are indeed correct that an Imperial pint is 20 Imperial fluid ounces. However, that equates out to approximately 19.2 US fluid ounces. Now, if only I could order a half-liter of beer (about 16.9 US fluid ounces) worldwide and get the same measure without resorting to stupid units that don't even correspond between different countries...
It is nice that UK bartenders are smart enough (even without the line!) to pour you a proper pint with the right amount of head. In the US, 3" or more of head seems to be considered acceptable at most places. It's always nice to find an establishment that will either let it settle (and ask if you mind waiting while it does), or pour off the head and pour more beer into the vessel to top it off to a proper level.
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD AND ALL THAT IS HOLY!
Well, this is one thing I don't mind. :)
Yeah, when you're already buying one of the high-profit-margin items (which drinks, even the alcoholic ones, are), there really is no excuse, EVER.
Ha...in my college town, 14 oz (we always figured it was 12oz) is a standard, a 16 or 20oz pint is a diamond in the rough....
Then again, that pint usually costs a couple bucks, not 6ish (like I paid in the non-college town I lived in)...
But I have noticed that what used to be $1 pitchers (of natty, etc) or $1 bottles (bud light, etc) have suddenly turned into $1.50, and happy hour that used to last from 4-7, now lasts from 5-7...
@jpp123: an Imperial pint is 20oz not "about 19"
One imperial pint is 19.2152068 US fluid ounces or 20 imperial fluid ounces.
@Major-General: Sure the head doesn't count. But every beer needs some to breathe.
The metered mugs leave the proper amount of room for head space. They are the perfect vessel. I wish they were coming stateside. It would nullify this controversy, but our government is too busy pretending alcohol is evil to do something good for it.
british pint glasses only, please.
NoOOOooooooOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!