by Mike on August 12, 2010
by Mike on August 10, 2010
Bar Of The Gods. How can you ignore that name? How can you even call yourself that? So I headed to online reviews like I often do.
Alexandra I – Bar of the Gods is the best!! This bar is what it is. The drinks are stiff and cheap (my favorite kind), but still tasty. Their happy hour is the happiest hour I have come across so far. It is EVERY DAY from 4 – 8 pm.
Andrew D. - Twice I walked in both very hungry and thirsty each time and walked out very satisfied both times.
Michelle H. – It really has everything you could want. You can catch a game on one of the TVs, but it doesn’t turn the place into a sports bar. I have yet to run into anything overly frat boy/douche/hipster.
It seems that the over all theme is strong drinks, friendly service from a dive-looking (they were named Top 20 Best Dive Bars in the U.S.) bar that is really just a great place to hang out. Not much else you could ask for.
From their website – “Bar of the Gods is darker than Plato’s cave, but only in terms of lighting. BOG is a friendly, lighthearted bar, populated mostly by a younger crowd of amicable mortals”
They have Pinball, Pool ($.50), open at 4pm with happy hour going until 8pm (which I rarely see) and open late.
You can find them at
4801 SE Hawthorne
Portland, Oregon 97215
503-232-2037
You can follow their sparsely updated Twitter account (Hey it’s dark in the bar) or the still-in-development Facebook page. Cut them some slack, it’s hard to keep up on all of this. 
by Mike on August 9, 2010
What do Cellar Door Coffee Roasters, Posies Cafe, and Open Space Cafe have in common? They serve some of the best coffee in the city and they’re all on Supportland. Supportland is a free rewards card that the offers incentives for buying local. It’s like a regular reward card, but instead of working at only one store, it works at locally-owned businesses across the Portland Metro Region. Customers can pick up the card for free at any participating business and start racking up points. The points can be redeemed for products and services from those same businesses. For example, Cellar Door is offering a 16oz coffee for 20 points. Customers can earn the 20 points by making purchases at any locally-owned businesses on the network. This is what makes Supportland such a unique collaboration between businesses.
Aside from the city-wide rewards program, businesses are also using the technology to carry traditional punch cards. Instead of multiple paper punch cards, customers can now carry all the punch card information digitally on the Supportland Card. For example, the Cellar Door punch card is “Buy 10 bags of coffee and get 1 free.” Every time a customer buys a bag of coffee at Cellar door and swipes their card, they get one step closer to a free bag of high quality beans.
Whether with points or punches, the Supportland Card has a clear goal of incentivizing consumers to shop locally-owned businesses. Everyone wants to support the mom-n-pops that make Portland great and Supportland has just made it easier. Hopefully this program will be popping up elsewhere as the technology has been built to export so other communities can support local. All the networks will have the ability to seamlessly transfer points between them so that consumers can travel and support locally-owned as well. Check it all out on Supportland.com.
Follow them on Twitter and Facebook.
Email – help@supportland.com
8316 N Lombard St #440
Portland, Oregon 97203
by Mike on August 4, 2010
Cash is king, especially for small businesses. You may have noticed more businesses requiring a mimimum purchase amount before they accept a card. Every time you use your credit or debit card businesses lose 1%-3% of your bill.
That cashback that Discover Card advertises? That comes from a charge to the businesses. That is why you don’t see Discover accepted everywhere.
If you want your favorite business to keep serving you, pay in cash when you can, they will appreciate it as profit margins are getting tighter and tighter for them.
