The team behind a self-service bar planned for Beach Road in Vineyard Haven say that the town has shot the idea down, and they are instead moving forward with a more traditional bar with two separate kitchens — one serving burgers and other bar food, and the other Caribbean food.
The bar, called M.V. Taps, is expected to open in the spring in the former Golden Bull building next to Five Corners, where they plan to offer a variety of craft and international beers.
Anderson Martins, the manager behind the establishment, said the original idea was to have a self-serve bar where patrons could swipe a card to pour themselves varying amounts of beer, whether a few ounces or a full pint. He said that there would have been staff checking IDs at the entrance, and staff on hand monitoring the volume patrons were drinking.
But Martins brought the idea to town officials, and said they interpreted Tisbury zoning to mean that someone had to actually be serving the alcohol; self-serving wasn’t allowed.
M.V. Taps is on the agenda for the select board on Tuesday at 4:30 pm.
Martins said they plan to open the new restaurant potentially by April, before bringing the self-serving concept back to the town with the hopes of getting approval for next summer. He said the system has been successfully adopted across the country, and can be done safely without the overhead of a traditional establishment. “The city isn’t there yet,” Martins said.
He describes the latest iteration of M.V. Taps as a traditional sports bar, noting they will make good use of the outdoor patio overlooking Five Corners.
Another way we get rid of employees and have machines take over. When labor cost gets to high time for a machine.
What could possibly go wrong?
Remember when there were definitely going to be no bars in VH if we voted for beer and wine licensing? Shocked, shocked that we were lied to.
So shocked. Remember the “Save our Town” slogan? Pushed by restaurant owners who live out of Town. Tisbury voted no to liquor licenses and preferred BYOB – a unique privilege that attracted people to Tisbury restaurants. But certain restaurant owners cried and pushed their profit agenda on us, oh my those poor restaurant owners, boo-hoo, and this time it passed but, under the condition there will be no bars and strict serving of booze only with a meal. So shocked we have bars and self serving pubs now. Tisbury also got boo-hooed into voting for a 46 million dollar upgrade to the elementary school, which cost 86+ million dollars. So shocked. Voters should not fall for the guilt/shame campaigns that out-of-Towners use to manipulate us and override our bylaws and budgets. I’m not sure if serving booze Saved our Town or the restaurants. There’s been a lot of turn overs. Turns out people don’t like to pay a lot for cheap booze and mediocre food. With that said, good luck to the new beer pub owners at Five Corners. Good food is the key to success.
Thank you Geraldine for bringing that up! How people forget so quickly. <3 <3
Mr. Martins, if you can, please try and get in touch with me, I would love to help in any way I can. I own a Self-Pour Taproom off-island and am from the Vineyard. I’d be more than happy to help.
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