Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2021 March 12

= March 12 =

Guinness only sold here
This picture from a bar in Dublin says "Guinness only sold here". What does it mean? "The only beer you'll get here is Guinness"? "This is the only place where you can get Guinness"? "We sell Guinness here, we don't rent it or give it away"? J I P &#124; Talk 00:52, 12 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Each of those is a possibility, but given the Irish pub context it will be understood to mean the first of these. My guess is that it's a mixture of wishful thinking by Diageo and their attempt at subliminal dissuasion from asking for an alternative to this liquid (which IMHO is hugely overrated). In a very different context it could have either of the other two meanings that you propose, although other wordings would be likelier (in Pyongyang, perhaps "Guinness sold only here"; in a trade show, perhaps "Guinness for payment only"). -- Hoary (talk) 01:40, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I suspect that tin-plate advert sign dates from long before "Diageo", and more from the era of the toucan or before? Martinevans123 (talk) 10:56, 12 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Indeed, we can see from the photo that the slogan, if taken seriously (which surely isn't intended), is untrue, unless the lever thingie for Heineken (a dreadful beer) is a mere dummy. And there also seems to be another thingie for some other brand of lager, though I can't read the lettering. And that's before mentioning the whiskeys, the gins, the sugary concoctions, etc., or of course the ciders. (Ugh. I'll take a Chimay.) -- Hoary (talk) 01:48, 12 March 2021 (UTC)


 * [Facepalm] — 's answer below is definitive. How did I not think of it? — Hoary (talk) 08:33, 12 March 2021 (UTC)


 * The sign is rather obviously very much older than the rest of the bar. Many pubs have old advertising signs as a form of decoration. Guinness is nowhere near as good as it used to be. Frankly I wouldn't bother with it nowadays. DuncanHill (talk) 01:57, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * It means that Guiness is only sold there; nothing else is done to it. In particular it isn't drunk there.  I suppose it can't even be carried away to be consumed off-premises, because that would be doing something to it other than selling it. --Trovatore (talk) 03:11, 12 March 2021 (UTC)


 * The sign is intended as a joke; something Guinness advertising used to be famous for. To avoid any ambiguity, in formal English "only" should always be placed immediately before the word or words that it modifies. That is an edit I make frequently.--Shantavira|feed me 09:28, 12 March 2021 (UTC)


 * The three different interpretations depend on which other word you link 'only' to, 'only Guinness', 'only sold', 'only here'. By moving the word only around, the disambiguation is reduced: In "only Guinness sold here", 'only' must link to 'Guinness'. In "Guinness sold here only", it links to 'here'. In "Guinness sold only here", it may link to 'sold' or 'here'. However, in the phrase discussed here, 'only' can link to the word before and the word after, and it can interestingly enough even jump across 'sold' and link to 'here'. The reason for this is somehow connected to a word that is missing in the phrase: 'is'. The grammatically complete sentence could be "Guinness only is sold here", forcing 'only' to link to 'Guinness', but it could also be "Guinness is only sold here". Here 'is sold' must be seen as one unit, even if it is split. The logical structure becomes "Guinness is-sold only here", even if English grammar allows another word order. Thus 'only' either can link to 'is-sold' or to 'here', giving the two remaining interpretations. --T*U (talk) 10:10, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * By the way, does anyone here know if the story about Guinness withdrawing from the US market after their unsuccessful launch in the '70s with the whole-page ad "Guinness is too good for you!" in NYTimes is true? Or is it just a good story? --T*U (talk) 10:30, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I'll drink to that!.  Paddy McGuinness 123 (talk) 11:02, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * p.s. a review of Guinness TV ads through the decades here. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:35, 12 March 2021 (UTC)


 * By the way, even if they meant "We don't sell anything except Guinness products in this establishment", that would still be a number of beers. Even 50 years ago, the Guinness brewery made a number of different products, many of which are available today; even ignoring the Guinness-licensed American-produced beers like the Rolling Rock-produced "Guinness Blonde" and the various recent "craft-brew" style beers released by Guinness's Open Gate brewery outside of Baltimore, the company has always had a number of beers; besides the classic "Guinness Draught Stout", there's "Guinness Extra Stout", the hard-to-find-in-the-U.S. and famously well-rated "Guinness Foreign Extra Stout", there's Harp Lager, Smithwick's, etc.  It's possible the advertisement was genuine that the only sold Guinness products; indeed prior to the "gastropub" and craft-brewery movement of the 21st century, it wouldn't have been uncommon for a bar to only carry 4-5 kinds of beer anyways.  -- Jayron 32 13:30, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * 'sup Jay? Do "doctors say you need a change"? Martinevans123 (talk) 13:42, 12 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Although not mentioned in our article, I rather think Ireland had tied houses. DuncanHill (talk) 13:40, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, in the UK "tied houses" are owned by a brewery and at one time only allowed their own beer to be sold there. They still exist in the UK but the concept of guest beers was forced on them by parliament and has persisted after the legal restrictions were lifted. Pubs which aren't "tied" to breweries are called free houses (sadly the beer isn't free). Ireland retained much of the British licensing laws which dated from the late 19th and early 20th centuries before independence.
 * Sam Smith houses are still rigidly tied. --ColinFine (talk) 16:54, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Not too much of a hardship as their ales are out of the top drawer. Alansplodge (talk) 18:54, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Ireland in the 1950s: News From A New Republic describes a campaign in 1952 by Seán Lemass to legislate against restrictive trade practices: "Guinness was an obvious culprit, with its system of tied houses — pubs that could serve only the company's products if there were competing lines".
 * Alansplodge (talk) 15:17, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * How much does a Guinness go for these days? It doesn't have to be a top-of-the-line Alec. Clarityfiend (talk) 03:03, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
 * According to this, just a little less then 10 guinneass. --T*U (talk) 13:06, 15 March 2021 (UTC)