The ‘Always Sunny’ gang built a business empire. Here are the best (worst?) products they tried to sell.

The Inquirer has covered plenty of real small-business stories over the years — but this isn’t them. Instead, we’re looking at the most outlandish fictional inventions and money-making schemes dreamed up by the gang at South Philadelphia’s Paddy’s Pub.

Paddy’s Pub, a hole-in-the-wall Irish bar off Second and Dickinson Streets, has a leadership team brimming with business ideas, spanning culinary creations and inventive alcohol delivery devices; however, none have been as successful as their flagship pub.

From basement gas hoarding to tuxedoed trash pickup, the bar’s so-called “entrepreneurs” have spent 20 seasons chasing get-rich-quick ideas that were doomed from the start. Here are some of the best (or worst) from FX’s It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

Fight Milk, the “unofficial drink of the UFC,” is also the first alcoholic, dairy-based protein drink formulated specifically for bodyguards, by bodyguards. Created by South Philadelphia entrepreneurs Ronald “Mac” McDonald and Charlie Kelly, Fight Milk uses organic ingredients like crow’s egg, whole milk, and vodka. A more gourmet version can be found online from InsideHook.

“I drink it every morning so I can fight like a crow,” said CharlieKelly, who is a janitor, not a bodyguard.

While some of the state’s biggest catfish have been caught in the Schuylkill with a recent uncertified 72-pounder in Grays Ferry in June, local bar owner Frank Reynolds has his eyes set on the Delaware River catfish, where he and business partner, Charlie, have also been fishing for “runoff crab” since the 2008 recession.

“Isn’t there some kind of sewage runoff around here?” Frank’s daughter, Deandra, asked. Despite the proven toxicity of the Delaware catfish, Franks cooks them regularly and Charlie maintains crabs are “sewage proof.”

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Gas prices can skyrocket — as Philadelphians saw in 2022, when prices doubled from two years prior. That’s why the owners of South Philadelphia’s Paddy’s Pub hatched a plan to cash in on future price spikes: borrow thousands of dollars from a bank to buy and store trash cans full of gasoline in the bar’s basement for a year, and sell it later at a markup. After filling up at local gas pumps and siphoning cars, the trio found little success selling their stash — due in part to one associate’s insistence on doing a Foghorn Leghorn impression during every sales pitch.

Later that afternoon, a van with tinted windows and full of gasoline exploded on a South Philadelphia block after its occupants bailed from the vehicle.

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Philadelphia’s “hottest culinary trend” is a steak boiled in milk and topped with jelly beans, something Charlie says should be ordered, “boiled over hard, with a side of your finest jelly beans, raw.” Try this now-iconic Philly steak at local fine dining restaurant, Guigino’s, where the milk steak is best paired with boxed wine in a can.

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In a union town like Philadelphia, strikes can inspire some to turn another person’s trash into their own treasure. During a trash workers strike, three South Philadelphia men decided to take on union labor — known in the trades as “scabbing” — but with a twist: They did it in tuxedos, driving a limousine. Classy, right? Unfortunately for the well-dressed scabbers, union trash workers caught them dumping garbage in one of the city’s lower-income neighborhoods. The sanitation workers surrounded the limo and rocked it back and forth, sending a clear message to back off.

“We can’t drive door-to-door in a windowless van … this is better,” one of the tuxedoed men, Dennis Reynolds, said.

“Plus, with the tuxedos — who wouldn’t want their trash man in a tuxedo?” Reynolds’ accomplice, Charlie, posited.

» READ MORE: I took the ‘It’s Always Sunny’ tour of Philadelphia. Sure enough, there were piles of trash and poop

A local man has devised a way to fool Jersey Shore lifeguards and police to skirt around alcohol bans on the beach — rum ham. Frank showcased his prized liquor-infused Christmas ham in Ocean City. It’s a Philadelphia delicacy he describes as a whole ham soaked in rum, topped with two slices of pineapple for the eyes and a Maraschino cherry for the nose — similar to “Wilson” in Cast Away. An unexpected turn of events, including a near-accidental act of cannibalism, had Frank and “Mac” lose their rum ham when they were lost at sea on a raft. Fortunately, the rum ham was later recovered after the duo were rescued by a party boat of revelers.

While paw covers and pet booties are widely popular today, readers may not know that the early prototypes for the cat protection footwear were designed right here, in a South Philadelphia apartment. Charlie, local janitor of Paddy’s Pub, designed the “Kitten Mittens” (or as Kelly spells it, “Mittons”) after alley cats kept him awake with their “stomping around.” These cloth-based mittens will have your cat slipping on every surface, but they’ll be doing it silently, Charlie said.

A new party game is sure to take over Monopoly’s reign as the game to end friendships — Chardee MacDennis, a portmanteau of Paddy’s Pub owners: Charlie, Deandra “Dee” Reynolds, Mac, and Dennis Reynolds. The game’s rules would be too hard to explain in the local newspaper, and when pressed, the game’s creators didn’t seem to have a firm grasp on them either. But it is possibly the most potent drinking game on the market. For starters, at some point in the game, you may be consuming wine intravenously through an IV drip. Cheating is encouraged throughout the game, which has rendered Charlie and Mac losers in a total of 18 games.

Frank has once again entered the business arena with a new take on the widely used “stress ball,” but with a twist. Instead of a comfortable, satisfying, and squishy object, he has decided to use hard-boiled eggs, dyed green like Paddy’s Pub, the South Philly bar he co-owns. However, the idea was quickly shelved after presenting a prototype to Dennis.The “ball” was still raw, and splattered egg yolk when crushed.

Canned wine has been around for decades, but some South Philly day drinkers devised a cheaper, DIY alternative for sneaking a sip before Philly’s 5 p.m. work bell — all while appearing to drink a Diet Coke. The method:Buy your favorite (or cheapest) boxed wine from Fine Wine & Good Spirits, chug a 12-ounce Diet Coke, then refill the can with wine.

“I’m loving this canned wine thing. I’m active, I’m gesturing with my hands, and I don’t feel restricted. If I was holding a wine glass, I’d be spilling wine all over the place!” Dennis said.