If you have been drinking on Commercial Drive in the last 4 years, you may have heard of the Storm Crow Tavern – it’s a well-established bar on the drive that has a lot of character. Recently, they decided to expand their operation and opened a second location on Broadway (at Fir) called the Storm Crow Alehouse. Usually, these spotlights highlight new and up and coming breweries and pubs; today, I would like to take some time to talk about a local community member that is a testament to how strong our locally bred community business really is!
I had the chance to walk into the Storm Crow Alehouse a few days ago for a friend’s birthday celebration and
at first I was taken aback. If I am being totally honest, my initial feeling was one of being a bit overwhelmed and unsure if I liked what I saw. It was busy, there was a lot going on on the walls and it seemed like it was trying too hard. But then, I sat at my table and really took a good look at what was around me – Tank Girl, a life-sized Han Solo frozen in Carbonite, menus that looked like the LCARS from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Hmm, maybe I was feeling this. Then, I looked closer – speakers behind the bar fashioned after Wesley Crusher’s (hilarious) outfits, Murals straight out of Dungeons and Dragons manuals from the 80s and a TARDIS bathroom door. Yes, I am definitely feeling this. Then, I started looking at the demographic. I saw people reading quietly, a raucous game of Cards against Humanity happening, I saw someone in a Bluejays jersey, I even saw a guy in a suit; Ok, a lot of different people are digging this!
So, I decided to come back and talk to the GM a few days later to get to the root of what they were doing at this new location. I was greeted by a smiling Sean Cranbury. Sean had served as a bartender for the original Storm Crow tavern four years ago, then moved to a front of house manager role and finally as the GM of the original location. Sean is first to admit, “I’m a book guy, I am not a hospitality industry person. I made no promises about how long I would be around (originally,) but we opened and it was great! The people were great, the owner was great. It wasn’t like working in a bar or a restaurant, so i stuck around!”
The original Storm Crow had maxed out, it was hugely successful and the 
owner Jason Kapalka wanted to see the brand expand a bit more. So he turned to Sean and asked him if he would be willing to open the new location. Sean agreed and they were off. I asked a bit more about the owner – being a card holding nerd myself I was very curious to know who the man behind this celebration of nerdism him was. I found out, that Jason was a key player in PopGames and was the creator of a widely successful game known as “Plants vs Zombies.” Suddenly it was all making sense, this is a widely successful computer game creator that wanted to create something special. Sean explained beautifully he told me that: “In his world, where you’re dealing with programmers, technology all the time, that’s how the money gets made. What he likes about this place, is a chance to have an analog reality that closely resembles what he executes in the digital world.” Which I think it is fantastic. It really is refreshing to hear a manager talk about their owner as someone that is passionate about what they’re doing. Not seeing it only as a source of money – but it’s something that they genuinely love and care about. Sean reaffirmed that when he told me “it is great to not have an industry point of view governing how we do things.”
What about the people – I had to probe more about that. Realistically, you have board games covering an entire wall, you have Doctor Who, Dungeons & Dragons, you have starships of all universes, and you have a rancor head mounted above the fireplace; how do you pick who is going to work at this place? I imagine they must have an encyclopedic knowledge of everything that nerds love and cherish. The answer surprised me a bit. “You hire quality people. Not all of these people have played D&D (they all want to someday,) they don’t come from the same place, and I don’t expect them to.” He went on to tell me how in the early days of the first storm crow they hired on nerdiness alone. He explained to me that that was a colossal failure. They may have had a knowledge of the subject matter, but the service was lacking incredibly. They learned that lesson, that you hire on the quality of people, not on a culture. Suddenly the culture became that anyone could come, it was everyone’s bar, their style just happen to be tabletop gaming and science fiction. Sean talked about how great it is that someone can walk into the bar wearing a Sedin Jersey or someone can walk in reading Chaucer and they can both enjoy the establishment. The culture is not one of exclusion, but of inclusion, which I think a lot of subcultures in our city could learn a thing or two from.
Our conversation eventually shifted to the beer selection which is quite diverse, and I thoroughly enjoyed. Sean compared building the tap list to his time working at Virgin Records downtown on Robson Street years ago. “I worked at Virgin, which was great for many reasons. But I loved it because I could sell Books in a rock and roll environment. I could be selling books in a bookstore environment. But at Virgin I could put James Joyce, next to David Sedaris, next to Graphic Novels, next to whatever. I feel the same way in how I curate this place – how I want us to approach draught, we have mainstays but we can get creative.” And I must say the tap list is incredibly diverse, I can get a good quality beer of any major style from a local brewery. Not to mention they have their beer engine, which is in my opinion the best way (only way) to enjoy a Real Cask Brewing mild – so that was great.
You’re on the topic of the bar and the beer, I had to ask about the steins that resided above the bar hanging from the rafters. I expected him to tell me that it wasn’t often program, where people could pay for a stein and have their own personal drinking receptacle at the establishment. Sean explained that that is initially how it started, but he felt as though they would get people with a few drinks in them sloppily buying a Stein (and simultaneously scrawling their band name on the washroom walls, more often than not.) He realized that paying for it is not quite what they wanted. “If you are a hero, meaning you have done something for the Storm Crow or something above and beyond the call of duty, you are a friend of the bar and are honoured with a stein.” The steins are engraved with the person’s name, and what hero number they are. They also get a card identifying them as a hero of the bar. As I said to Sean, that is exactly what you want a local pub to be like. You want it to be about community and not about buying your way in.
Outside of that, there’s a lot of really cool aspects to this place – you can, for example rule a D20 (20 sided die) to decide on what beer you like to drink, what shot you would like to drink, you can even build a burger much like a D&D character sheet by rolling for your condiments and toppings. They have themed drinks and cocktails, like the Romulan Ale which comes out a greenish-blue an is smoking from dry ice. Shawn says there’s very few things cooler than when a tray of those drinks goes across the bar.
So what does it look like for CAMRA moving forward and this fantastic place? Well first, Sean was very gracious in offering our members a 10% discount at both storm crow locations effective immediately. But I did discuss what else we could possibly do, and we are toying around with the idea of holding an event there. Being big and games myself, I think it would be great to hold a members gaming night at the storm crow. So keep your eyes peeled on the website, our social media and the newsletter for more information on that.
In the meantime, head on down to the new Storm Crow Alehouse – I guarantee you will not be disappointed.
**Storm Crow Alehouse and Storm Crow Tavern offer a benefit of 10% off your bill to our members!**
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