The Oregon legislature, always on top of the state’s most pressing issues, wants to regulate the size of bars’ pint glasses:
Some Oregon legislators want the state to help ensure that Oregon’s beer drinkers who order a pint get the full 16 ounces.
The “Honest Pint Act” is aimed at the practice of selling “pints” of beer in glasses, sometimes with thick bottoms, that can’t hold the full liquid measure of a pint.
The bill, which got a hearing last week, would have state health inspectors on their regular rounds inspecting beer glasses for capacity. The extra review would entail a fee, the amount of which has yet to been determined, the Register-Guard of Eugene reported.
Barkeeps who pass the test would be rewarded with a decal, to be displayed on a window or door, proclaiming their establishments to be purveyors of an “honest pint.”
The proposal is voluntary for now, thankfully, but it might not remain that way. Local beer blogger and economist Patrick Emerson calls on the state to require officially marked glassware in all Oregon pubs. Before we take that step, it’s worth considering what people mean when they ask for a pint.
Sometimes when we use a measurement we have an expectation of precision. When I buy a gallon of gas, I expect to get a gallon. But I’m writing this post from a coffee shop where I regularly order a “cup” of coffee. I’ve never checked to see if the cup they sell me is exactly 8 oz (or any of the other official definitions of a cup). The volume of coffee I get here varies slightly from the amount I get at other places around town. In this context, a cup is loosely defined as whatever is a customarily acceptable amount of coffee, not as a precise measure.
I suspect that asking for a pint of beer is more like asking for a cup of coffee than a gallon of gasoline. When I say that I’m going to the pub for a pint of ale I don’t mean that I’m going to drink exactly 16 ounces of it. I mean that I’m going to drink some beer in the customarily acceptable range of volumes in which it’s generally served.
In this sense the pint glass has come to mean a glass of the type beer is served in rather than a precise measure of volume, similar to how Martini and Collins glasses have taken on the names of the drinks they’re associated with. “Pint glass” pretty much just means “beer glass” to many consumers.
Note that there is no call for an “Honest Wine Glass” project. The amount of wine served will vary from business to business and bartender to bartender. As long as pours are reasonable, no one seems to mind. Is there any reason that beer is different, except for the fact that beer glasses happen to be called pint glasses? (Contra beer, wine glasses seem to be using the lack of a standard definition to get larger.)
Patrick Emerson correctly notes that there’s an asymmetric information situation here: Bars know how much beer they’re pouring and consumers don’t, making direct price comparisons among bars difficult. But this is only a problem if people really care about the precise volume they are served. And even if it is a real concern, there are alternative solutions to government intervention. Jeff Alworth’s Honest Pint Project is an admirable one: A voluntary, non-governmental certification program designed to increase consumer information and reward bars that participate. Bars voluntarily buying marked glassware is another.
I wish Jeff luck with the project, if for no other reason than that it will lead to more bars serving bigger glasses of beer. I’d be happy to be proven wrong and see demand for 16 oz pints proliferate. But if after raising awareness of pint discrepancies the Honest Pint Project or the Oregon government’s equivalent doesn’t get traction with bars and consumers, that doesn’t necessarily mean that stricter regulations are necessary. At the end of the day certification may be a solution in search of a problem. Voluntary approaches test whether this a legitimate concern among consumers. If their choices reveal that a “pint” doesn’t have to refer to a precise measure, our language and our commerce can survive the ambiguity.
Permalink - Share/Save - Comments (6)
Jacob Grier is a freelance writer, barista, mixologist, and magician in Portland, OR. He writes, eats, and drinks a lot. His articles have appeared in The Washington Post, Reason Online, The Oregonian, and other publications.
Follow me on Twitter
Jacob, if you walk into a coffee shop and ask for cup of coffee, what’s the first question you’re asked in response? Exactly: “What size do you want.” Both “cup” and “pint” can refer to specific measures (8 oz and 16 oz, respectively), but only “cup” can also mean the much vaguer “some amount of liquid in a drinking vessel.” There’s not really any ambiguity when discussing what a pint is; no one’s going to ask you, “Umm… do you want the 11 oz pint or the 15 oz pint?” If I order a pint of beer, I want 16 oz of beer, and if I’m in the UK, I want a full imperial pint (something which is required there). Here in the Czech Republic, beer glasses are marked, and if a pub uses smaller glasses (say .4 litre glasses instead of half litre glasses) that pub will charge less per drink. Czechs know this and would, thusly, never pay the same amount for beers of different sizes. I think this kind of transparency should be encouraged for the sake of consumers, and, also, that it really does represent honesty in the market place.
In my experience, if you’re friendly, consistent in your patronage, and a decent tipper, you’ll never have to worry about whether or not you’re getting the proper amounts in your glass.
@DWW: 1) This is the US, not the Europe. 2) What kind of coffee shops are you visiting these days? You know not all coffee is served in tall, grande, and venti paper cups. Get back to America and good coffee, post haste!
@Sithmonkey: Here the problem is the size of the glass, not stingy bartenders. No matter how nice you are to them, there’s no way you’re getting 16 oz in a 14 oz glass.
I’ll concede that many higher-quality coffee shops do not offer different sizes in-house, but I think my original point still stands concerning the difference between the possible meanings of “pint” and “cup.” Regarding your second assertion, I’m not convinced that it’s relevant or meaningful. Do you think that Americans are not interested in knowing exactly what they’re getting for their money, or that Americans are insensitive to measure? I guess the key piece of information to have would be whether a bar were selling a 14 oz beer clandestinely (by way of fake pint glasses) as a “pint.” If this were the case, I believe the bar could be said to be acting dishonestly. It would another story were the bar simply to offer “glasses of beer” or “draught beer,” but in that case, I think it would be fair for the bar also to list the number of ounces per serving. Why should any of this be a secret? Incidentally, let’s not discuss the quality of the coffee that’s available to me at the moment…
Are you saying a Dark Lord of the Sith can’t manipulate bartenders and alcoholic liquids to his advantage?!?
How Dare You Sir! How dare you…