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Information about Happy Hour

For other uses of "Happy Hour", see Happy Hour (disambiguation).


Happy hour is a period of time, which is usually an hour or two (hence happy hour, two for the price of one) in the late afternoons Monday through Thursday, and sometimes Friday (usually taking place between 4 pm and 7 pm - peak rush hour for many workers) during which some restaurants and bars give discounts for drinks, especially alcoholic drinks. The idea is that it acts as a promotion of the venue during the quieter times.

The term originated in the United States Navy. In the 1920s, “happy hour” was for on-ship performances. “Happy” in this context meant slightly drunk.

The idea of drinking before dinner has its roots in the Prohibition era. When the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act were passed banning alcohol consumption, citizens would host “cocktail hours” or “happy hours” at a speakeasy — underground drinking establishments — before eating at restaurants where alcohol could not be served. Cocktail lounges continued the trend of drinking before dinner. "Happy hour" entered civilian use around 1960, especially after a Saturday Evening Post article in 1959. Happy hour has become a tradition for many workers, white and blue collar alike.

The push against drunk driving and alcohol abuse has curtailed the use of the happy hour to some extent. In the 1980s, bars started providing free hors d'oeuvres to lower the blood alcohol content of patrons. Glasgow has banned happy hours to reduce binge drinking, as has the Republic of Ireland. Even the U.S. military got in the act, when in 1984 they abolished happy hours at military base clubs.

Despite the controversy, happy hour still exists around the globe. Today in the United States, "Happy Hour" culture consists largely of junior and mid-level professionals getting together for a drink to unwind after work. In the United Kingdom, the cocktail hour serves a similar purpose, but traditionally begins at 5pm and ends an hour later.

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Happy hour is the practice of offering alcoholic beverages at reduced prices for a specified period of time.

Happy Hour is used in several contexts.
  • Happy Hour (1974 album), by Tony Booth.
  • Happy Hour (1985 album), by Ted Hawkins.

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restaurant is an establishment that serves prepared food and beverages to order, to be consumed on the premises. The term covers a multiplicity of venues and a diversity of styles of cuisine.
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Sales promotion is one of the four aspects of promotional mix. (The other three parts of the promotional mix are advertising, personal selling, and publicity/public relations.
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An alcoholic beverage (also known as booze in slang term) is a drink containing ethanol, commonly known as alcohol, although in chemistry the definition of alcohol includes many other compounds.
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United States Navy (USN) is the branch of the United States armed forces responsible for conducting naval operations. The U.S. Navy currently has over 340,000 personnel on active duty and nearly 128,000 in the Navy Reserve.
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Prohibition of alcohol, often shortened to the term prohibition, also known as Dry Law, refers to a sumptuary law in a given jurisdiction which prohibits alcohol.
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United States of America

This article is part of the series:
United States Constitution

Original text of the Constitution
Preamble
Articles of the Constitution
I ∙ II ∙ III ∙ IV ∙ V ∙ VI ∙ VII
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The Volstead Act is the popular name for the National Prohibition Act (1919). It enabled Federal enforcement of the Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which had banned the "manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors" in the United States.
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SpeakEasy was a United States military project to use software defined radio technology to make it possible to communicate with over 10 different types of military radios from a single system.
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The Saturday Evening Post was a weekly magazine published in the United States from August 4, 1821 to February 8, 1969. From 1897, it was published by Curtis Publishing Company.
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Blood alcohol content (BAC) or blood alcohol concentration is the concentration of alcohol in blood. It is usually measured as mass per volume. For example, a BAC of 0.02% means 0.02 grams of alcohol per 100 grams of individual's blood, or 0.
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Glasgow
Gaelic - Glaschu
Scots - Glesca, Glesga


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Please see the relevant discussion on the .


The British Medical Association states that "there is no consensus on the definition of drinking.
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Anthem
Amhrán na bhFiann  
The Soldier's Song


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BBC News Online (more recently referred to as simply the BBC News website) is the website of BBC News, the division of the BBC responsible for newsgathering and production. Forming a major part of bbc.co.
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