There seems to be an almost universal mind-set that draft beer is better than packaged beer. This is why people come to the brewery and want to fill their growlers with the same beer that they can buy in a bottle. Happens all the time.
Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve had my Pils on tap at a restaurant three times. After the first two times I was convinced that draft wasn’t ever going to be better than our bottled beer. Why? Draft lines. Dirty draft lines will strip nuance from just about any beer. A well kept bottle of my beer was much better than either of those two draft beers. The third draft beer I had was from a system with pristine draft lines, and it was a revelation. It was every bit as good as a bottle of beer, maybe better.
I have been a zealot about keeping our bottles refrigerated at all time to preserve freshness and make sure they show as well as possible. I now see that the same issue holds for draft beer. If you have favorite watering hole and the beer hasn’t been tasting quite a good as usual, you might want to ask them when they last cleaned their draft lines. It makes a huge difference.