Getting Lit--Again

Lighted beer tap handles are nothing new. I did a column about these devices about two decades ago. See the blog post below this one. But the purpose then, beyond the novelty, was simply to attract the eye to a product.

These guys have a different idea. They want to produce tap handles that actually inform and entertain the patron as he sits at the bar. I suppose forty-plus large flat screens and personal smartphones may have lost some of their appeal to the electronically-addicted?

Bad enough that the main reason people went to pubs and taverns since they've been in existence was to meet and interact with other people--even if that "people" was just your barman. The liquid was always just a lubricant for conversation or a complement to a meal where that conversation occurred.

Now we need lighted gimmicks to attract and keep customers? And at $1,000 a pop for one handle, this will pay for itself over time? I doubt that guys like Chris Flynn of Haileys, Pete Jacobs at The Dive and Barry O'Donovan at Kilkenny House would assess this as a wise business venture.

But hey, there may be some independently wealthy pub owner--perhaps a chain--that would be interested. If so, have at it.

But where the PubScout comes from, it's the people in the pub that provide the entertainment, the beer choices that serve as a catalyst to interaction and the ambience of the place that seals the deal. And only the patrons need to worry about getting lit.

As I said twenty years ago: Getting "juiced" or "lit" it seems has always been a one way affair. No longer. But pubs might possibly become brighter places with this innovation. The added lustre could reflect more accurately the features of a current conversation partner, which, in turn, might help patrons make wiser, um, decisions that might not look so good in the next day's sunshine.

Lights or not, the allure of the pub is probably as firmly ingrained in the human psyche as the allure of the flaming hearth, which strikes an internal chord in all of us calling us to its glow.

Just one question remains in the eyes of microbrew lovers. Does the new invention give an unfair advantage to "Light" beers?

Only until you taste them.