I’ve recently been talking to people about making us a kitchen-ish area.
Personally, what I would like to see is a few limited cooking facilities to enable people to nuke a pie or make grilled cheese sammiches or an oven bake pizza. I’d like to take the counter top from the set of cupboards from the laser cutter room along with that water filter and install it in place of the massive double sink that’s there. I’d also like to finish, then install the lovely strip timber table we have out in the wood working area to use as a bar.
On this note I’d like to get some other opinions. Does beer on tap for sale at the space sound like a good idea or not?
We are allowed to sell alcohol without applying for a permit so long as it’s for no longer than 8 hours and we stop serving before midnight. That’s if I’m reading it all right, can someone else go through them and check it out please?
We can buy 47L of a variety of beers and ciders (including alcoholic ginger beer) for between $120-$200 which would mean we could have whatever we liked on tap for $3-3.50/schooner which would be awesome and make the space a bit of money.
I think it’d be great, what does everyone else think?
I’m 100% against the sale of alcohol on HSBNE premises unless it’s a organised activity (Not every week).
We have a lot of equipment and things that could really hurt people, slightly intoxicated people with less common sense could be fatal.
Not needing a permit is one thing, but I’m sure you still need a RSA and that person will have to be the one selling it. I’m sorry but not it…
Members don’t clean up after themselves, having alcoholic beverage containers everywhere will detract even more to the place.
As for a kitchen, sure I would like a kitchen but reluctant to have anything due to point 3 above…
As a community as a whole WE NEED TO CLEAN UP MORE.
There is a handful of people who are cleaning up after everyone else and it’s unacceptable, it’s unacceptable that they have to be cleaning up after all you slacker in the first place.
That’s basically what I expected from at least a portion of the membership, hence my asking. If we were to do it, I have a current RSA and I’ve worked as a bartender previously, so I’d be happy to play bartender. Included in the new kitchen would be a dishwasher as requested by nog, I’d be glad to serve and wash on a tuesday evening if it meant making a bit of cash for the space.
It goes without saying that it is totally unacceptable to operate machinery or power tools under the influence of alcohol. I think everyone understands that. Though, it might pay to wait until after we’ve got the swiper dealies installed on everything beforehand to be able to lock people out to make sure no one forgets.
I feel this is a good idea, having seen alcohol at the space before when it was freely given away as a one off by a certain member, I don’t see drunk people being an issue, you literally couldn’t give away a case over the evening, the biggest drinkers had 2 bottles, and nobody did anything silly.
I feel that we could kill 2 birds with one stone here, put a $10 deposit on having a beer glass, that way we both know who has glasses (thus can control equipment use) and any clutter left around earns the space $10 an item… a very tidy cleaning fee if I do say so myself. May sound inconvenient, but regulars probably will just hold onto a glass in there members storage ect.
I’m also not so sure about doing this during visiting hours on open day, it dramatically increases the risk of people we don’t know either taking objection or doing something stupid, but even 4-5pm and one call just before midnight is totally chill, and as such I see no issues here if Karl has a current RSA and is willing to do this.
Finally people often have alcohol over dinner anyway, and are free to bring there own drink into the space (which I have done). Thus any use of tools ect by drunk people is already as much of an issue now is it will be, other than the fact nobody currently has any feeling of responsibility to stop people drinking and “fucking it up for everyone” like they will if we do this. We can’t ignore people are already drinking by just avoiding responsibility, but at the same time we can’t ignore that we have never had a problem either, as a good deal of people don’t even go over to the workshop, and drunk coding\bread-boarding\soldering isn’t a big deal.
In short I would buy beer, its a shame about not after midnight but it is what it is and I think it still can be a good thing for HSBNE if we do it sensibly.
Selling grog is a great idea. After all, it keeps all the football clubs in business.
It definitely needs to be only available when somebody with an RSA is there to watch over it. Operating power tools afterwards would be very stupid but I think we’re all responsible enough to not drink and drill. If there’s serious doubt, the lock on the alcohol could be powered by our RFID cards and disable access to the tool armory etc for an hour after the purchase of a drink.
A reusable bierstein with a deposit would be ok, but I don’t see disposable PET cups being a big problem. They’re dirt cheap and recyclable, and it’s not hard to throw them away (we’re not having an issue with cans are we?).
I definitely don’t agree with selling beer on a Tuesday night. It’s uninviting to newcomers and would project a “mens shed” atmosphere.
When would we sell it then? Movie nights. Aaron and I set up the screen for the outdoor cinema last Tuesday, and Karl has found all the speakers we’ll need and generously loaned us his projector to use. I’ve got all the equipment to produce butter popcorn en masse too, which has an even greater profit margin. Combine it with a few lazy beers and we’ve got a really good recurring social event that’s suitable to bring non-hacker friends and spouses to. Community outreach starts with community presence, and social events are the best way to build it. Also money, we want money.
Just a little comment here - every Tuesday evening I personally throw away around a dozen cans that people didn’t throw away, and it takes me half an hour to an hour to clean up all the other miscellaneous rubbish people leave lying around. You don’t see it because I’m always trying to clean it up before it builds up to become a big a problem.
That is a pretty solid plan. Monetizing laziness = limitless cash.
I don’t think it would be a great idea to have booze of a Tuesday night all points raised above are . It just doesn’t seem like it would be a good fit. A Thursday or Friday movie night however, seems to me like a fine way to get some folks along and good fun to boot.
I like the idea of Friday… for most people its ending the working week with beer, pizza and a movie with friends. Thats sounds pretty awesome to me. However on the flip side it may also cause more schedule collisions for people though… so it’d be good to see a show of hands for people who want to come to this sort of gathering and when they are available.
Plan is to have it on an all inclusive cart to just wheel out into the middle of the courtyard and play/watch whatevs and only need a power cord to run it.
I agree with you, I wasn’t trying to force Rut4gers hand, however information is power, and given Thursday OR Friday was mentioned I think it’d be good to know what suits people. For example if twice as many people said they could go on the Thursday its likely going to influence the organizers choice. I respect this doesn’t mean that Rut4ger will necessarily pick the more popular option, one may turn out to be easier, or he may in fact just want a quieter night. Either way nothing is lost by asking, and the information gains could potentially change the outcome.
