Cafés, restaurants and sports bars are altering business hours, redecorating and retooling menus to court soccer fans in anticipation of the 2010 World Cup, which starts June 11.
City staff won’t allow sports bars to start selling beer until at least 9 a.m., said Chris Ballas, who is the assistant general manager at the six-month-old Red Card sports bar at the corner of Seymour and Smithe streets.
His restaurant will still open four hours early, at 7 a.m., each game-day between June 11 and July 3, when the final early match is televised.
The World Cup final is scheduled to be played July 10 at 11:30 a.m. Vancouver time.
Beer sales start promptly at 9 a.m., and Ballas’ bar will sell beer imported from the eight countries that he believes are favourites. The list includes Spain, Brazil and Germany.
Staff have also specially designed cocktails from those presumed favourite countries. For example, the Spanish cocktail contains sangria while the German one contains Jägermeister.
Gerry Nichele’s Vita beer and wine store, which is in the same building as Red Card, specializes in having one of the largest selections of international beers in Vancouver.
“We got PVRs specifically for the World Cup,” Ballas said. “We’re planning to be replaying all three of each day’s games at different times in the day.”