So when a blackout robbed the central-west city of Orange on Saturday afternoon, the Hotel Orange bar manager ran down the road to Kennards.

"We hired six generators, thinking it would be all night and we'd be the only pub open," Mr Savage said. He paid $900 in cash and while other pubs shut their doors, beers flowed at the town's oldest public house.

"It got busy...because our kitchen was still open. Everyone wanted to eat, and [drink] coffee. We were the only ones who had a coffee machine on."

Almost 9700 premises were affected by the blackout in Orange and surrounding towns including Spring Hill and Lucknow. It struck shortly before 2pm and power was restored just after 4pm, Essential Energy said.

Orange mayor John Davis said he was stunned by the spread of the power outage, which also hit the Cadia-Ridgeway Mine about 20 kilometres south of the town.

"It's the biggest blackout in years, just unbelievable," he said, although his own home was unaffected.

Businesses in the CBD closed, while shoppers and employees at the town's major shopping centre were told to go home. Many of them escaped the 12 degree chill by filing into the Hotel Orange.

"We're in Orange so the cool room was out but the beer was still bloody cold," Mr Savage joked.

The cause of the outage is being investigated, an Essential Energy spokesperson said.