Taproom design that sells beer

The taproom is your best salesperson

In a bar or a store, your beer competes with everyone else's. In your own taproom it does not. Guests arrive wanting to try your beer. The room decides whether they order one safe pint or a tasting flight, a food plate and a growler on the way out.

Design here does not mean expensive interiors. It means making the beer easy to understand, easy to order and good to look at. Many of the best taprooms are a concrete floor, long tables and a clear tap wall.

Make the tap wall the focal point

The taps are the product display. Put them where every guest sees them from the door, at eye level behind the bar, with the name and the style readable from a few metres away. Tap handles that match your label design tie the glass in your hand to the can in the fridge. Our guide to beer label design covers how to build that visual system.

If you can, let guests see the brewhouse or the tanks through glass. Stainless steel is the best decoration a brewery owns. It tells the guest the beer is made right there.

Design the beer line backwards from the glass

This is where many taproom designs go wrong. It is a brewing problem, not an interior one. The bar is usually placed for the look and the cold room ends up wherever there is space. Then the beer runs through a long line from the cold room to the taps, it warms up and it pours as foam.

Keep the run from cold room to tap as short as you can. Where the run is long, it needs a glycol cooled python so the beer stays near serving temperature all the way to the tap. Balance the system so a standard draught line pours at a steady rate. In Indian summers, a beer that leaves the cold room at 2 to 4 °C and warms in an uninsulated line will foam at the tap no matter how well it was brewed. Every foamy pour that goes down the drain is beer you paid to brew.

Menus that help people choose

A good beer menu does three jobs. It tells people what each beer tastes like, it gives them a safe choice and an adventurous one and it nudges them towards a flight.

• Order beers from light to dark or by flavour, not by when you brewed them.
• Give each beer one line of description in plain words. "Crisp, bready, a little floral" beats a list of hop varieties.
• Show ABV for every beer. Many guests choose by strength. It helps them pace themselves.
• Offer a tasting flight of four or five small pours. It is the best way to turn a curious guest into a regular.

Keep the menu board and the printed menu identical. Nothing frustrates a guest more than ordering a beer that sold out yesterday.

Light, sound and seating

Lighting changes how beer looks and how long people stay. Warm light over the tables and brighter light at the bar works well. Avoid coloured lights over the taps, because they make a pale lager look green and a stout look grey.

Hard surfaces like concrete and steel make a room loud. A few acoustic panels or fabric make conversation possible. Conversation keeps people ordering. Mix seating: long shared tables for groups, a few small tables for couples and some bar stools for people who want to talk to the brewer. In much of India an outdoor or semi open area is worth more than an extra indoor table, as long as there are fans and shade.

Flow, food and the way out

Think about how a guest moves. Door, a clear view of the taps, order, find a seat, food arrives, second round, toilets, exit past the fridge and merchandise. If the route to the toilets passes the growler fridge or the T shirts, you will sell more of both. If guests have to queue at the bar for a refill, put a server on the floor at busy times.

Food matters more than many brewers expect. Guests stay longer and drink at a sensible pace when there is good food. Our guide to taproom events covers ways to fill the room on quiet nights.