Blitz Opens New Sports Bar
Last Week, Blitz Bar opened a second location in Southeast Portland in addition to the company’s Pearl District pub. Similar to the Pearl bar, the Southeast spot at 2235 SE 11th Avenue (Between Hawthorne and Division at Sherman) offers a clean, open environment with foosball, billiards, several flat screen televisions, and a decent tap selection. With several humdrum tap offerings sponsored by In-Bev/Anheuser-Busch taking up the coolers, there were still at least five to ten desirable craft beers on tap at last visit. Trumer Pils, Rogue Dead Guy, Shock Top Wit, New Castle Nut Brown, New Belgium 2 below, and Lagunita’s IPA were the best they could offer, but the beer isn’t the real selling point here (too bad, because we’d go every day). It’s the atmosphere. Fresh particle-boarded walls and booths clad the brewpub-esque atmosphere. Friendly staff and decent food make Blitz comfortable enough. Sports coming out of every corner of the room (if you are annoyed by
televisions at a relatively high volume or a jock mentality, don’t go here). The beer selection was a little disheartening when attempting to drink through a full game, but the place offers a full bar with lots of liquor, if that’s your bag. For the beer enthusiast, it wasn’t amazing, but for the sports fan who likes to go out and catch a game, Blitz is smokefree and immaculate. A comfortable set of couches in the back side of the bar offer views of a projection mega-screen television. Overall, we found Blitz nothing to write home about, but definitely worth checking out.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 2009
BLITZ PEARL & BLITZ LADD Re-Launched
with New Look, New Menu, New Attitude
Over the last two months while the economy has been swirling in confusion, the folks who run Blitz have been at the grindstone repackaging their bar/restaurants on both sides of the river. Still locally owned and operated, both Blitz locations have accomplished extensive interior improvements and completely redeveloped their menus, pricing and service approach to better engage their neighborhood markets.
A little less ‘collegiate sportsbar’ and a lot more ‘neighborhood bar’, Blitz brought on Northwest native Todd Morey to redevelop the model and the atmosphere at both locations—the new Blitz on the edge of Ladd’s Addition and the original Blitz location at the head of the Pearl District, kitty corner from Powell’s Books. Morey was the operational and culinary mastermind behind Doug Fir through its opening back in 2004-2006. As the new Director of Operations for Blitz, Morey is injecting some old-school, Portland identity into the company’s new image.
“We needed to make it good, cheap and approachable for the people who live or work right around our front door,” Morey said. “There aren’t many places in the Pearl like the Low Brow or Fuller’s Coffee Shop … we hope to be seen as a place that offers some tried and true, local comfort to our local people.”
While particleboard and beer signs are no longer the central design elements, Blitz has retained 50¢ pool tables and free shuffleboard at both locations, and has installed a couple lanes for steel-tipped darts at Blitz Pearl. They have also brought table service into the business model so that customers can lounge a little more instead of always standing in line at the bartop.
The new menus are geared toward simple Portland-style comfort foods, big on affordability and scratch ingredients. Both locations feature a new lunch and dinnertime menu as well as an “Early/Late” menu where affordable is key during both afternoon and latenight hours. All the menus have options for meat eaters and vegetarians alike. Over at Blitz Ladd, they also feature thin-crust pizza and a kids menu.
The new cocktail list has been developed by Blitz’s new Bar Division Manager, Elizabeth Markham, who will be a part of the opening crew at Kevin Ludwig’s much anticipated new bar, Beaker & Flask. The beer list has also been rebuilt from the ground up to reflect Blitz Pearl’s dozen tap handles, with another twenty taps over at Ladd. Ten selections of local and imported wine are all priced to pour, starting with house wine for only $2.50 a glass.
BUSINESS HOURS: Seven Days a Week, 11am to 2am
MENUS: Lunch, Dinner and Early/Late
HAPPY HOUR: Everyday, 2pm to 6pm
OUTDOOR SEATING: Both locations
CHILDREN: Allowed at Blitz Ladd until 9pm, Kids Menu
RESERVATIONS: No way
For further comment or any question, please contact Todd Morey, Director of Operations
???? Direct: 503 490-8783
???? Email: blitz.todd@gmail.com