The pub will open Thursday for a benefit (open to anyone, but with a ticket cost) then will be open to the general public starting Friday.
Five minutes, 320 taps, 270 craft beers on draft.
Those are the numbers I crunched last weekend after McLadden's Irish Publick House opened its doors for a one-day sneak preview on St. Patrick's Day. The pub will open Thursday for a benefit (open to anyone, but with a ticket cost) then will be open to the general public starting Friday.
So what do those numbers up top mean? As I've said before, my neighborhood is maybe one of the best in the country when it comes to craft beer on tap. And with McLadden's opening, it just got even better: Now within a five minute stroll of my doorstep, there are around 320 taps, with about 270 of them featuring craft brews at any given time. (Yes, I walked around and counted.)
McLadden's ratcheted this number skyward, of course. The new venue features 105 taps, largely of the American craft nature, but also Irish and other European brews. And I'm not even counting pubs just outside the five-minute walking radius. There is also (obviously) the Northampton Brewery (about seven minutes away) as well as Packard's and even the Iron Horse, which has a few craft beers on tap.
It's a bold move by McLadden's, which has two other locations, in Hampden, Mass., and West Hartford, Conn. Northampton is clearly a pretty saturated market when it comes to craft beer (obviously, based on the numbers from my part of town alone). Can the town sustain another craft beer venue?
My guess is (a reserved) "yes." While the new kid on the block may spread the local beer bullion thin for a brief period, I think the beer economy will settle in and everyone will be fine. Each of the places carrying mostly craft beer in large quantities has its own niche. None of them are quite like any of the others.
And so it is with McLadden's. Owners Michael Ladden and Curt Gemme did a fabulous job renovating the former Pleasant Street Theater building. The place is gorgeous and fairly reminiscent of a real Irish pub. Dark cherry woodwork, a rustic feel and a space conducive to talking to strangers (which happened several times during my time there last Sunday) sets a good scene. The only thing that takes away from the old-world charm are the TV screens. But trust me, many old pubs back in Eire now feature flat screens. Such is the world we inhabit.
And while I welcome any new craft beer venues, the downside is that I now have to stretch my beer money to cover yet one more place. But I guess that's a nice "first-world" problem to have.