Producer

The story of Barkeep Cocktails begins in a basement. Two founders, Matt and Jeff, are longtime bartenders and leading mixologists in the Canadian Cocktail scene, got their start with a cocktail catering business, Clever Barkeep. We purchased our current space on Portland St. in our home of Dartmouth to expand Clever Barkeep with the aim of sharing cocktail knowledge, and quite frankly, for storage space. But thanks to some push from family and friends, we took the leap and opened our first cocktail bar- Dear Friend.

The bar opened July 2020, mid-pandemic, which forced our doors closed multiple times. This constant game of tag between opening and closing allowed us to discover a game changing opportunity for the area – cocktails-to-go. When it came to creating recipes and concepts for our canned drinks, we kept three ideas as our north star: 1. quality, using hand selected local ingredients, 2. innovation by raising the standards for canned cocktails, and 3. approachable, as a cocktail shouldn't be pretentious.

From selling cocktails-to-go during the pandemic manifested the idea of Barkeep Cocktails. A sister company of Clever Barkeep that offers one-of-a-kind, hand-crafted cocktails. Now you can enjoy cocktails made from high quality, local ingredients with unique flavour notes, within the simplicity of a can, providing an amplified experience- not just a great cocktail. Drinking craft cocktails just got a whole lot easier.