Hop Cask and Barrel Open

In April, GM noticed that a new liquor store was coming in to replace Wagners. It’s name: Hop, Cask and Barrel.

This slightly fancy sounding name sounding promising to GM, but it wasn’t until last weekend that he had a chance to stop by. And his first impression is generally good. It certainly exceeds the last incarnation of Wagner’s, but that’s would be a pretty low standard. More to the point, for liquor it appears roughly on par with (if not slightly superior to) Wagner’s circa 2009. GM is basically useless when it come to evaluating the wine selection. Based upon numbers alone it seemed ok(?)

And that would be fine, but it’s not like Georgetown lacks serviceable-to-good liquor and wine stores.

But what it does lack is quality beer stores, and on this account Hop, Cask and Barrel excels:

It has two walls of coolers packed with craft beers. And according to the staff, it will only get better. They will eventually provide growler fills (although that is often a place customers can get ripped off) and will offer craft beer kegs.

Given the huge market (or trend depending on your cynicism) in craft beer, it was odd that none of the Georgetown liquor stores catered to it (with the exception of Safeway’s decent selection). So GM welcomes Hops Cask and Barrel hopes it continues to exploit this market failure.