This Is Why I'm Like This: The Death Of A Pub

  Jim and I joked that the Ironworks was part of the trifecta of that shopping center. With a stupid amount of generous parking and its location two doors down from the church and across the parking lot from the gym, it was the anchor for any day of the week. Except before 3 pm on weekdays, because he never did open for lunch, which might have saved him.
  Jim started stopping in on weekends about eight years ago when he would take Mongo (his Harley) out for a ride. He'd stop in afterwards because it was dark, in need of updating and a cooler temperature than outside and it had been. A craft beer, in fact, that he actually liked. And so it began, and slowly I would stop in after the ride. Then we'd stop in on an occasional evening. Then we joined the gym, and well, you might as well stop by after the gym. Then we added my dad to joining us on Fridays and just like that, we had a pub.
    Over the years we've been frustrated when he runs out of our beer, with his sad, sagging menu and his seemingly relentless refusal to clean the place up. On one hand it's kind charming that it still feels like the 80's, on the other you need to clean your taps and fix the Diet Coke. We watched waitstaff come and go, and a bartender that was part owner was also dethroned and exited. We noted the staff, in general, sure drank a lot on their shifts, to the point that they could become unable to do their job. This was a line I have no patience for, as I've worked in enough bars to know you should be fired for that behavior.
    The last two years, after the only good cook he's ever had left in an alleged fight over how to cook bacon,  we started to truly worry about business. Friday nights would be packed but only until 8 pm. The menu did not improve with the spike in business, and the service worsened unless it was "S", who'd been there a t least two years. He started running out of the craft brews on a frighteningly regular basis, and Jim's beer never did return. The staff was drinking more, and business was tanking. He wasn't changing up the open mike night, or trivia, or karaoke, and there would be ten people there for the band on Saturday.
   He also ran out of Budweister beer. Budweiser. Why do I see him at King Soopers buying pub supplies? Shouldn't he be ordering through a supplier? Hmmm....
   In comparison, to the north west less than half a mile is the Westrail, who moved into a difficult building (it's changed hands at least three times) with no parking, who is packing them in nightly. Fresh menu, they don't brew their own but have Avalanche and other brews on tap. Packed. Every night. The new place to the south and east is Mannings, a bit more upscale with less room at the bar and even worse parking than Westrail, and packed every night. Again, they aren't brewing their own and they have a functioning kitchen staff and interesting menu. A bit further east, there is Great Frontier  brewery, a delightful converted Meineke shop run by a CPA turned brewer and still a CPA. Small patio, small seating area, brews his own. No kitchen, he uses food trucks and allows patrons to Grub Hub. Packed occasionally, he's been going strong for two years. And then there's Fiddlesticks, which is like Ironworks all grown up. They're the same kind of 80's set up with a massive bar and pool table pit that makes me smile. Good outdoor seating where people smoke, not great parking, and a solid bar menu of fried deliciousness. They don't brew their own, they're serving Avalanche and Coors and...they're packed on a Monday night.
   When the city of Lakewood seized the business, we were coming to the gym. After our workout we legit felt lost. What now? We decided to try Mannings. Turns out, it's expensive to drink and eat when the staff aren't too trashed to charge you.
   Now that we have no choice but to be good citizens, we've cleaned out the garage, packed up the spare room downstairs, repotted some plants. I even washed the dog. I manage to make it to yoga more. It's terrifying.
   We've talked for years of opening a place, a pub or small breakfast restaurant (Golden needs one, badly, if anyone is interested, they've nothing going on for breakfast), just something that's Not Teaching. The conversation spiked a bit after Ironworks closed, because that place should have been a gold mine. He's brewing on site AND has a kitchen AND has parking. Dude, how'd you screw that up? With the Fed Center and Hospital up here, and the examples I've given in previous paragraphs, he should have been packed constantly. I don't know his life. I don't know why he didn't pay any employees at all the last two years. I don't know why he didn't pay his brewer. I have no idea where the money went, I only watched his inability to make any more of it.
   Jim made noise about getting a small business loan. But in all honesty, I don't think we want to work that hard.
   But it feels like we lost a family member. We had pub friends, and it was a place Harp had started to take her friends as well, and she'd chummed up with the wait staff too.
   I don't know what else to say.
   RIP Ironworks.