At Dirty Dog Taphaus, a 6-ounce beer is not necessarily a half-finished pint. In many cases, it is the point. Nearly 3 million ounces have been poured since the downtown New Glarus business opened in April 2022, and owners Leah Hanson and Keith Kube say the average pour is about 6 ounces — evidence that customers have embraced the chance to sample rather than settle on a single full glass.

The idea started four years before Dirty Dog opened. Hanson and Kube were visiting Denver in 2018 when they came across a self-pour taproom. They liked it enough that they kept returning whenever they were in the Denver area, and the conversations eventually turned from how much they enjoyed the concept to whether it might work back home.

“We continued to talk about how exciting we thought the technology was and how much fun it would be to have something like this in a place like New Glarus,” Hanson said.

Dirty Dog eventually opened at 101 6th Ave. in the former Zweifel Jewelry building, combining the couple’s self-pour idea with one of downtown’s historic commercial spaces. The 30-tap system uses technology that tracks what customers pour, allowing them to try small amounts or fill a glass and pay by the ounce.