Please tell me it's not true. I just finished an article in the latest Newsweek that the pubs in the UK are in trouble and closing. It refered to the high price of beer in the pubs as opposed to buying it at the store and consuming it at home.

My fondest memories of my visit to the UK is when I was in the small village pubs talking to the locals. The article stated that more and more of these pubs are dissapearing after several hundred years of being the social center of the community.

Say it aint so.

 

Sadly its true,
Many pubs in the villages have closed, and even larger pubs have gone. AS you say, they can not compete with the supermarkets on price and also the the very active police presence on our roads looking out for people leaviing pubs in cars, to stop and test for alcohol. The only pubs that are making money are those which are realy just restaurants with bars, that belong to the national chains. Sad, but true! But, if you look hard enough, there is still the odd nice village watering hole to be found - join one of our UK Crossfire meets and you will surely find one!
Steve

 

There has been on average 4 pubs a day closing since last year, I know I work for a company that delivers beer ! The smoking ban has hit and the none smokers that were supposed to return to the pubs haven't, and there is also the fact that younger drinkers are "pre-loading" i.e. meeting up and drinking cheap booze from the supermarket before going to the pub, they then spend less in the pub. 2009 is destined to be the first year that supermarket sales match pub sales and the trend is due to continue

The rot all started with a goverment change called the "beer orders" in the late 80s and the demise of the industry was set on it's way... speaking as someone who then worked for Bass the biggest brewer and pub company in the UK at the time.

Anyway all these pubs have paid for my Crossfire so far, lets hope there are enough pubs to keep me employed and able to afford the fuel to put in it

Can I ask that everyone goes to the pub this weekend and has a good drink, I need to buy some tyres soon !

cheers,

Paul

 

I'd love to come over and have a beer or three. Make mine a Guinness Stout or Bass Ale. There's just this obstacle called the Atlantic ocean it the way.

You brought up "pub company". It seemed that a lot of pubs were owned by the brewery's. Are those in trouble also? Is the government trying to stop excessive drinking? I remember from being in the UK that your drunk driving laws are much more strict than ours.

 

I must be the minority then. Pubs/restaurants have been closed doors to me because of the smoking. I’m asthmatic, and an evening in a pub with smokers would mean a night of bad breathing. Since the smoking ban, I’ve probably been in more pubs than before.

 

I also have Asthma and have spent more time in pubs than before, just needs to be more of us ! The question from Chuck65 about "pubcos" is that one of the consequences of the beer orders that split the breweries from the pubs is that it was found that pubs were far more profitable than brewing beer, Bass Brewers got sold to Coors who now own it and the pubs found that there was more profit in food than beer apart from town centre pubs full of young people with lots of money to spend on stupid quantities of expensive lager and getting drunk.

I wrote to my MP at the time and foretold all of this as did a lot of people in the industry and now it has all come true !

Luckily there are still a few good pubs around, my local the Queens Head does a selection of real ale and has a choice of different cheeses, with granary bread and pickles.. perfect It is also within a few hundred yards of the proposed "cars in the park" Crossfire meeting next year........

cheers

Paul