BAR OWNERS GRASP AT STRAWS
Propose to-go cocktails to stay afloat
On the surface, it may seem absurd trying to sustain a business by offering Moscow mules or Manhattans to go. It may also seem that many Montreal bar owners are grasping at straws, but with their businesses shut down due to COVID -19 and with few other options available to them, they’re proposing such action to help keep them afloat.
Quebec’s Ministry of Public Security has put the kibosh on bars offering to-go cocktails for now. Bars are permitted to provide cocktail mixes sans hooch for takeout, but that doesn’t go a long way in terms of owners covering their costs.
Barkeeps note that restaurants can sell not only take-away meals but also beer and wine, while bars aren’t allowed to peddle their specialty wines, beers and booze — which are not available at the SAQ.
“We’re in a real bind,” Jeanphilippe Haddad says. “If the situation continues for long, I don’t know how many bars here can survive. We’ve tried to communicate with authorities, but we’ve been kept in the dark.”
Haddad co-owns one of the city’s — indeed the country’s — most enticing and intimate bars, the 30-seater Cloakroom on de la Montagne St. Voted No. 7 on the 2019 list of Canada’s 50 best bars at canadas100best.com, it could pass for the sort of darkened lounge where Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall might have whispered sweet nothings to one another over martinis. It’s almost hidden behind a high-end haberdashery and hip barbershop.
Even if bars were allowed to open at 50 per cent capacity, such a scenario wouldn’t work in Cloakroom’s tight quarters.
So the question is: are patrons interested in getting cocktails to go when it’s primarily the social interaction drawing them to bars in the first place? Plus, customers can easily satisfy their alcohol urges at the SAQ.
“Absolutely, customers want cocktails to go, and we are getting a lot of requests for them,” insists
Haddad, who also co-owns Old Montreal’s über-cool Stillife bar and downtown’s Soubois nightclub. “We’re seeing this everywhere around the world now where bars are closed — in Asia, Europe, the U.S. There’s been a huge demand for it.”
Haddad cites the example of New York’s 105-year-old Dante NYC, voted No. 1 for 2019 at worlds50bestbars.com. Dante had been given permission to sell cocktails to go, and has been doing booming business during the pandemic.
Haddad also points out that there are bars and restaurants in Montreal providing this service illegally, which he won’t do.
“If restaurants can offer beer and wine for takeout, why can’t we also sell our craft beers and natural wines, not available at the SAQ? Our bars are sitting empty and we have all this inventory just sitting there. We’re getting financial help from the government and our landlords are being pretty co-operative, but we still have bills to pay.”
This takeout proposal doesn’t entail Moscow mules or Manhattans in glasses filled with ice — which would likely melt in a nanosecond in these climes. Rather, the bars would put the prepared cocktails in bottles, which could last for several days in the fridge.
The Atwater Cocktail Club — No. 5 on the canadas100best.com list of 50 best bars for 2019 — has been selling cocktail mixes, but co-owner Christophe Beaudoin would prefer to add booze to the mix for takeout.
“It’s better than nothing having the premixes to sell, but we just want to be able to offer takeout, like restaurants, for our specialty wines and beers as well as our cocktails,” says Beaudoin, also co-owner of Milky Way in the Pointe. “We’d also like to do takeout for our imported vodkas and rums, unavailable at the SAQ.
“If bars are going to stay closed for a long period, we have to adapt, and this looks like our only option. But it’s not cocktails to go just for us. This is an awful situation that’s also affecting many wine bars and brasseries which can’t offer takeout food and can’t sell their specialties. Something has to happen, before Montreal loses its amazing nightlife.”