Family-run Toronto pub with one of the best patios in the city getting a second chance after 'disastrous' four years
A family-run pub in Toronto that’s been around for over 20 years is getting a second chance, as the city has fallen back in love with it.
The past four years have been nothing short of “disastrous” for business, Keating Channel Pub owner Shakir Omar, who goes by Shaq, tells Dished Toronto, but things are finally on the rebound.
Situated on the Keating Channel, which connects the Don River to the inner Harbour, the Keating Channel Pub has been an institution (for those in the know) for more than two decades, frequented by residents of the Port Lands, Leslieville, Riverdale, the Outer Harbour and the Canary District as well as, perhaps most prominently, members of the film and T.V. industries working out of the bevy of nearby studios.
A Star is Born
The location — which we’d hazard to say is among the most unique for a restaurant in the city — had been owned and operated by the Toronto-based rock band The Irish Rovers when Shaq came to possess it. He had been working as the General Manager for several of the band’s other restaurants (they also started the Unicorn on Eglinton) when the Rovers decided to leave the restaurant business.
Shaq proposed the pub in 2003, and by 2004, the Keating Channel Pub was born.
It’s your classic Irish pub, but with a decidedly Toronto-centric slant, walls lined with photographs from the city archives depicting lesser-known histories. It also, resting right on the water, has one of the most expansive and serene patios in the city. If you can’t manage to figure out how to access it by car or on foot, you can always take a boat and walk right onto the patio.
It was an instant hit, Shaq tells Dished Toronto. With lunch rushes from film crews and scores of committed regulars, on top of Shaq’s family and devoted staff keeping service top-notch, things were beautiful at the Keating Pub. Until they weren’t.
“It came to a point, I would say, in 2018, 19, 20, I mean, they were all glorious years for sales, for profit, for the staff that worked here, for the customers that came here,” Shaq tells Dished Toronto. Even when the pandemic hit, their 275-person patio proved indispensable.
The Dark Ages
With two rounds of lockdowns impacting business, Shaq, like many business owners, had to go to the government for benefits to keep things afloat during that time. Immediately after all the debt was paid off in 2021, though, construction on the Port Lands revitalization project began. The Cherry Street bridge was relocated, cutting off access to the pub from the west and, for some time, Villiers Street was also closed.
In 2023, another hit: the Writers Guild of America’s lengthy, five-month strike, which stalled production on nearly every piece of scripted television and film coming out of North America at the time. Since the beginning, film production crews have been some of Keating Channel Pub’s primary customers. When the film industry was in paralysis, they lost them.
“To be honest with you, we almost didn’t make it,” Shaq admits. “I made less money in all 12 months of 2024 than I did in the pub’s first nine months in 2004.”
Up until then, the pub never really needed to use social media as a marketing tool. Word of mouth was enough to keep lunch rushes busy and evenings full, but amid the mounting adversities, the team was left with few other options.
So, he enlisted his niece, Sierra Bein, who, like many of Shaq’s family members, had also spent five summers working as a server at the pub, to start posting on social media. Quickly, through the magic of the algorithm, scores of new eyes were falling on the Keating Channel Pub.
A New Hope
One of the first videos Bein posted, simply showing off the pub’s patio at dusk, has since garnered an impressive 250,000 views on TikTok. Another is approaching half a million. Food influencers are now visiting to try out Keating’s famous (if you know) fish and chips, which they still serve the old-school way, wrapped in newspaper.
“We don’t have experience, neither of us, doing TikTok, and the only thing we went in attempting to do was… a lot of it is just like, here’s a picture of our food, here’s what the patio looks like. It’s allowing the space to speak for itself, and somehow that’s working,” Sierra tells Dished Toronto. “So I think that’s, like, one of the most exciting things.”
Coupled with the 2024 opening of the new Port Lands bridges, the completion of the nearby Biidaasige Park, and the rapid reinvigoration of the Port Lands area in general, the Keating Channel Pub is on track to make a full rebound.
The pub has been so popular this summer, in fact, that they announced, in late July, that they were hiring summer staff for the remainder of the season, when, going into the warmer months, traffic had been so slow that summer staff was neither a necessity nor a possibility.
“I’m just so grateful there’s this new wave of people kind of discovering what we’re about, especially in this era of influencers taking you to these she she downtown spots and fancy places, like, our vibe is generally more like, come hang out, have a good time, relax, be outside of the city and just connect with us,” Sierra says. “I think, you know, we’re offering something a bit different.”
It’s that exact “something different” that’s kept the Keating Channel Pub a local stalwart for the past two decades. A place set away from all the buzz of the city, with good food, the right drinks, and a peaceful patio rivalled by few others in town. Moreover, it’s the people, many of whom are Shaq’s biological family, others who have been working there so long that they’re just considered as such, that really make the difference.
Now, a whole new crop of people is discovering that secret sauce, and they could be the secret to keeping the magic alive for years to come.
Keating Channel Pub & Grill
Address: 2 Villiers St.
Phone: 416-572-0030
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