History

The building itself has been a licensed premises for over 200 years with records showing the service of refreshments back in 1802 in what was then the country village of Douglas.

Mary and John O'Connor purchased the South County from the brewery, Beamish & Crawford in the mid 1970's. The brewery owned a few 'tied' houses in Cork at the time and decided to sell them to concentrate on production rather than the retail end of things.

It was very much a family business for many years and John & Mary handed over the operation to their two sons Tom and Colm when they returned home from the U.S. where they had been working in the hotel, restaurant and general food and beverage business for a number of years.

Tom and Colm took over in the years 1997 -'98. In 1998 they completed an extensive refurbishment of the premises introduced Live Irish Music Sessions and began serving lunches on a daily basis.

More recently, at the end of 2009 a major overhaul of the pub was done. Much of this was in the back of house with an upgrade to the store area, refrigeration and the installation of solar power for the hot water in the pub. A water harvesting system was also designed and installed in the plant room and now about 80% of water used in the South County comes from rain water !

Big improvements were also made in the front of house while still maintaining the old world atmosphere that the South county is famous for. A state of the art kitchen was also added during construction that took about 12 months to complete.

Now the new South County looks even older with open fires, a cozy snug , new party areas for informal gatherings and a really great outdoor drinking and smoking area - the Guinness beer garden.

Check out our gallery to take a look or call in to really get a feel for our great atmosphere.