# Schooners In Victoria



## super_simian (10/7/12)

So when did schooners (425ml) become _de rigueur_ for Victorian drinkers? I'm currently working a bar in Richmond, and without looking at our glass sizes, many punters walk in and ask for a schooner. We only have pots and pints (except the fancy shmancy Peroni glasses, which are 300ml) and this leaves some people stunned. 

When I started drinking in pubs (and bars,and nightclubs and etc,) about a decade ago, you could barely even find proper pints outside of the inner-city, it was just pots and jugs! These people can't all be inter-state interlopers, can they? Can anyone shine a light on when and why schooners found their way into the heart of the average Carlton swilling scumbag? 

That being said, I don't mind "souveniring" a nice straight sided schooner when I can, because they fit a 330-375ml stubby with room for decent head, without looking half full like a pint. But last I checked, only a few swanky city beer bars stocked them.


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## tricache (10/7/12)

Schooners are standard up here in QLD, I actually have trouble finding a pub with pints really. Pretty much everywhere is pots or schooners but I have noticed pots slowly being phased out and pints starting to come in.

Does this mean we drink too much in QLD? LOL


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## DU99 (10/7/12)

i remember going to sydney years ago and it was midi's and schooners..


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## tricache (10/7/12)

DU99 said:


> i remember going to sydney years ago and it was midi's and schooners..



Yeah I remember the whole midi, pot, schooner, pint issue back when I was in uni...asked for one and got something a different size :huh:


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## glenwal (10/7/12)

DU99 said:


> i remember going to sydney years ago and it was midi's and schooners..



Pretty much just schooners now, though some places (like irish pubs) sell pints.

Anyone who orders a midi gets beaten to death by their mates.


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## Spiesy (10/7/12)

Yep... it is happening. I wonder if it's happened with Lion Nathan buying into Vic pubs?

The most confusing state is SA. Where they have pints, but they're not normal pints, they're a schooner size... wtf?


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## tricache (10/7/12)

Glen W said:


> Anyone who orders a midi gets beaten to death by their mates.



I think that's an Australia wide thing, kind of like ordering a shandy :lol:


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## Bribie G (10/7/12)

When I arrived in Aus in the late 70s to Queensland, beer was served in seven and ten ounce glasses, except in metro Brisbane where the small glass was eight ounces. Five ounce glasses were common in places like bowls clubs and in fact our RSL still keeps a few sevens and fives for the really ancient old diggers.

Drinking was a lot different back then, you went to the red pub or the blue pub and stood at or near the bar with your buddies and sipped, lay your cash on the bar and the barmaid would fill your seven regularly and help herself to the cash and return the change to the pile.

I remember Schooners starting to appear in the mid 80s, about which time the term "pot" came to be used for the half pint, prior to that it was always a "ten". Now Schooners are the "default" in Bris and you have to deliberately ask for a pot. 

Pints came in with the Irish and UK themed pubs. 

When I was in Geelong in 2004 I went to the Waurn Ponds pub and asked for a Schooner, and was given the education "oh no, we don't have them in Victoria, the beer would get hot too quickly". It was 9 degrees outside :huh: 

Two years later they were drinking pints in the same pub.


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## hughman666 (10/7/12)

You'll be able to get real pints (568ml) in a lot of Adelaide pubs (inner city) if you ask for an Imperial Pint.

Otherwise you'll be stuck with the 425ml piece of crap, referred to with complete derision by discerning drinkers as a Poofter's Pint <_< 



Spiesy said:


> Yep... it is happening. I wonder if it's happened with Lion Nathan buying into Vic pubs?
> 
> The most confusing state is SA. Where they have pints, but they're not normal pints, they're a schooner size... wtf?


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## bum (10/7/12)

Hey, OP (anyone remember OP?) - the trend has been growing for the last few years. I've been secretly hoping that warmer beers will drive people towards better beers but the ultimate upshot seems to be that people drink them quicker so they get smashed sooner so they're more betterer than pots.


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## Spiesy (10/7/12)

hughman666 said:


> You'll be able to get real pints (568ml) in a lot of Adelaide pubs (inner city) if you ask for an Imperial Pint.
> 
> Otherwise you'll be stuck with the 425ml piece of crap, referred to with complete derision by discerning drinkers as a Poofter's Pint <_<


what sort of pint measures 425mL? According to Wikipedia, it's neither an imperial pint, and English pint or a converted-to-metric Aussie pint.


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## Wolfy (10/7/12)

I presume it's like many other things, the vendor supply and serve goods in smaller quantities and charge the same or more, equates to bigger profits.
I save any trouble with glass-size names, local or interstate, and just point to the glass I want my beer poured into. 
(Even better if it makes a nice souvenir). h34r:


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## Bribie G (10/7/12)

When I was in Welly they were drinking pints in conical glasses. One of them made a sneaky return to Queensland B) and on measuring, yup it's a schooner. 
I notice that some Sydney pubs are now using them.


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## DU99 (10/7/12)

when i first went a pub it was a glass or a pot...then there was a thing called pony 6oz..and sydney barmaids use to pour beer straight into the glass no tilting,large head's on the beer..two goes at pouring a beer what waste


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## hughman666 (10/7/12)

Spiesy said:


> what sort of pint measures 425mL? According to Wikipedia, it's neither an imperial pint, and English pint or a converted-to-metric Aussie pint.


Exactly. 425ml is a schooner. 568ml is an Imperial Pint and in a lot of the inner city Adelaide pubs unless you ask for an Imperial Pint (i.e. the 568ml full job), you'll get lumbered with the poofter's pint aka schooner...


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## Wolfy (10/7/12)

Bribie G said:


> When I was in Welly they were drinking pints in conical glasses. One of them made a sneaky return to Queensland B) and on measuring, yup it's a schooner.
> I notice that some Sydney pubs are now using them.


Not just Sydney, are you sure there is not an 'Archive' logo on the other side of that glass?


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## JDW81 (10/7/12)

There were a few pubs which ditched both middies and schooners for the schmiddie. Half way between both (about 350mL i think), but the sneaky f*&Kers still charged you schooner prices <_< . Needless to say I didn't go back to those places again.


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## cam89brewer (10/7/12)

Try living where I live, go down to the pub 500m down the road and get a pot or drive 10kms across the border and get a midi! :lol:


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## Wimmig (10/7/12)

Spiesy said:


> what sort of pint measures 425mL? According to Wikipedia, it's neither an imperial pint, and English pint or a converted-to-metric Aussie pint.



Nothing new here... Venues have been doing this for a very long time. Most of the time, i find, it's of pure error. They confuse serve sizes, have promo glasses which are non standard or just don't know what to do. Just to be clear, consumers can expect volumes to be a constant when ordering. A naughty venue in Alexandria, Sydney got smacked with a dirty big fine for selling drinks ordered as "schooners" [425ml] which were served and given as "schmiddies" [355ml]. Staff didn't seem to care, nor the operators. OLGR seemed to think otherwise. The same applies to all over drink sizes. X should be X. 

Naughty naughty. Feel free to dob them in if you have an issue with it. I don't care myself if it is sold as such. Though, some places rub me up the wrong way when i order X, get told it's X and it's in person Y....smackdown. 

Sizes are sizes.

Pint 568ml
Schooner 425ml
Schmiddie 355ml
(i would add others, but am not used to them in NSW)

It's not just limited to beers. If you look closely most big venues always show "Example Product, XXXml - $XX.XX". This levels the problems, and clarifies them. Both in on premise, and off premise. With complex beer menus these days....it would be good practice for all venues to show up front, clear, ml sizes. It has positives for the venue (consistancy & clarity) and positives for the consumer (clarity & known serve size).


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## fawnroux (10/7/12)

Personally, I find this a touch confusing.

I'm a Victorian, and have never drank anything BUT schooners. When I was 17 I went and lived in the UK and spent my time drinking pints. I got used to that as the norm. When I came home, I couldn't order a pot, because it seemed so damn small, so I just always grabbed a schooner. Most pubs I would asked for a pint (circa 2000) but very few, even in Melbourne served them, so schooners it was. Over the last 12 years, I've seen this change, much to my delight. A lot of places sell pints these days, many when I go to Melbourne are of the "only pots or pints' kind. 

So, this is a serious question, were schooners not a popular option in Victoria before? I'm 30 now, but have never drank pots, and have always got schooners in Melbourne? When did they become more popular?



cambrew said:


> Try living where I live, go down to the pub 500m down the road and get a pot or drive 10kms across the border and get a midi! :lol:


I've never ordered a midi over the river, I s'pose in Albury they have to be 'bi-lingual'


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## razz (10/7/12)

Most of the odd sizes are conversions from ounces. A schooner used to be 15 ounces and became 425ml in metric.


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## Spiesy (10/7/12)

fawnroux said:


> So, this is a serious question, were schooners not a popular option in Victoria before?


No... that's kinda the point of the whole thread...


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## fawnroux (10/7/12)

Spiesy said:


> No... that's kinda the point of the whole thread...


Perhaps, but as I've had a different experience, one's perception doesn't always equal reality.

It seemed strange to me that pints were somehow normal, bur schooners not so. That's why I asked my question.


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## Spiesy (10/7/12)

fawnroux said:


> Perhaps, but as I've had a different experience, one's perception doesn't always equal reality.
> 
> It seemed strange to me that pints were somehow normal, bur schooners not so. That's why I asked my question.


In Melbourne, it's been predominantly pots for my 16-years of pubbing... with pints becoming more prevalent as time has gone on, to now becoming almost as normal as the pot. But I have noticed the emergence of the Northern schooner creeping southward.


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## Clutch (10/7/12)

Haha, you dumb bastard,it's not a schooner, it's a sailboat.


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## fawnroux (10/7/12)

Spiesy said:


> In Melbourne, it's been predominantly pots for my 16-years of pubbing... with pints becoming more prevalent as time has gone on, to now becoming almost as normal as the pot. But I have noticed the emergence of the Northern schooner creeping southward.


Interesting.

Maybe coming from a border town the schooner was more prevalent and not so strange, hence why I'm more used to them. I guess when I go to Melbourne and ask for one, I'm one of the minority  

Another reason I always got em was value for money. I always felt I got more bang for my buck with a schooner, so to speak. More so again with a pint. Mind you these days, the beers I order in pubs are way more expensive than the old carlton draught i used to get.


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## Tony (10/7/12)

Glen W said:


> Anyone who orders a midi gets beaten to death by their mates.



:super: Amen to that!


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## DJR (10/7/12)

Glen W said:


> Anyone who orders a midi gets beaten to death by their mates.



Well not sure about death, but there would be some jokes. 

But a Middie of light beer however... that should carry a minimum mandatory sentence for crimes against being Australian


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## stakka82 (10/7/12)

I'm from Melbourne, and growing up it was all pots and jugs (I'm 30). Pints seem to have become more popular over the last 10 years.

I dont think I had ever even heard of a schooner till I was at least in my early 20s.


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## raven19 (11/7/12)

I thought we had it nailed correctly here in SA, and all you other states have it wrong! :lol:  

Good thing I drink at home nowadays. But yeah we are behind the times and love confusing interstaters....

Here in SA its:

Butcher 185ml (seldom orders or seen)
Schooner 285ml
Pint 425ml
Imp Pint 565ml (-ish I think)

A while back, a similar thread was discussing this and the move to metric. 250, 500 and 1L nation wide would make things easier!


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## Bribie G (11/7/12)

As the old guy said in George Orwell's "1984" - I miss the old pint, half a litre isn't enough and a litre makes me pee.  

What do the Yanks drink? Their pints are completely different to ours - 473 ml. Which is why "going down to the store to get a gallon of milk" isn't quite as startling as it sounds.


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## raven19 (11/7/12)

Bribie G said:


> What do the Yanks drink?



Could not care less what they drink mate. We are our own nation!  :icon_cheers: 

1L = pee > winning!


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## Feldon (11/7/12)

Funny thing is that while the British pint has infiltrated Australian pubs, the Australian schooner recently got legal sanction to be served in British pubs.

_'After exerting an unrivalled grip on Britains drinkers for centuries, the traditional pint of beer faces its first substantial competition: from a Whitehall-approved smaller measure.
While the imperial pint saw off the last threat from Brussels three years ago by winning an unlimited opt-out from metric measures, pub traditionalists have lost their battle to halt the serving of less capacious Australian-style schooners. '_

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/fo...internalSearch#


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## Pennywise (11/7/12)

Clutch said:


> Haha, you dumb bastard,it's not a schooner, it's a sailboat.


 :lol:


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## milestron (11/7/12)

Personally am not fussed whether I get a schooner or a pint as long as the price is relative - but seems like most places where I've ended up with a schooner has been at pint prices (in perth)


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## winkle (11/7/12)

milestron said:


> Personally am not fussed whether I get a schooner or a pint as long as the price is relative - but seems like most places where I've ended up with a schooner has been at pint prices (in perth)


Perth pint prices usually = other states 1 litre prices


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## adam (11/7/12)

Bribie G said:


> When I was in Welly they were drinking pints in conical glasses. One of them made a sneaky return to Queensland B) and on measuring, yup it's a schooner.
> I notice that some Sydney pubs are now using them.
> 
> View attachment 55727


So now does the Brekky Creek Hotel! For at least 3 months now, schooners 'off the wood' comes in those conical glasses.
I was told that they were less likely to break when dropped - but I miss the shorter, fat at the top old style glasses


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