Arizona gets its third World of Beer Monday when the national chain of craft beer bars opens at SanTan Village shopping center at the 202 and Williams Field in Gilbert.
World of Beer made its local debut in August 2012 on Mill Avenue in downtown Tempe. It added a location in Tucson six weeks ago.
The Gilbert bar, located next to Kona Grill and just around the corner from Total Wine, will have 60 beers on tap plus a beer engine. Another 500-plus beers will be available in cans and bottles.
The 2,900-square-foot Gilbert location is similar in size and layout to the Tempe one, although there’s no balcony for live music performances. Instead, the Gilbert bar features a small floor stage.
Gilbert has a larger kitchen than Tempe and will offer a menu of bar bites like pretzels, chips and salsa, onion rings, pig wings, and flatbreads.
“With Tempe, for the first year we just did beer, then we added the craft spirits and the small foods,” general manager J.P. Watts says. “(Gilbert) is just going to open up with everything.”
The Gilbert location has a much larger cooler than the Tempe one. One of its first big events will be a Sierra Nevada tap takeover featuring nearly 100 of the California brewery’s beers.
The takeover was scheduled for Jan. 18, but had to be pushed back due to the government shutdown. It’s now likely to take place Feb. 22, the final day of Arizona Beer Week.
It may not set a world record as planned – the previous record of 70 beers recently was broken by a 100-beer tap takeover in Michigan – “but it’ll definitely be a record for Sierra Nevada and for Arizona,” Watts promises.
Roll-up garage-door-style windows allow bar access to the covered patio, which can seat about 50 people. Watts says misters probably will be added before summer to mitigate the southern exposure.
World of Beer Gilbert will be open from 11 a.m. to 2 a.m. daily, although Watts says the hours are subject to change.
“I left here last night at 10 o’clock and there was nobody around,” he says. “But that could be because nothing around is open. We’re hoping the mall employees will stop in after work. We’d be more than happy to stay open until 2 if there are people here.”
