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How to Run Down a Pub
by Ian McLaren
My friend John was recently offered the freehold of a local pub,
the Kings Arms. It was a good price, especially if he could close
it down and sell it for housing. There was only one snag: the
council wouldn't let him close the business if it was still viable,
so he came to me for some tips about how to run it down efficiently.
As I told John, there are three proven ways to ruin a good pub:
have a bad atmosphere, bad service or bad beer. If you want to do
the job efficiently, you will need to create all three.
We started with the atmosphere. There are three prime factors: the
landlord and his attitude; the customers and the pub itself. You
might think that the pub is a fairly fixed thing, but it's the
details that count. Start with the outside: if you leave litter
around, let the paint peel and the windows get grubby, it's
surprisingly easy to put off the passing trade. You might also
leave up tatty, out-of-date advertising and make sure the door
sticks tight. Of course, the regulars will still know how to get in.
Even if you let the interior decay, the toilets flood and the
ashtrays build up to ceiling height they may not take the hint.
Move on to stage two – recruit some new customers to drive away the
regulars. Live music is often a good tool, especially if it is
played very loud: you might even get the neighbours to complain and
have the environmental health department close you down. The band
will probably bring their hangers-on, who will annoy other customers
and never come again. Theme nights can be good as well – one-off
visits from karaoke freaks, motor-cycle gangs, S & M junkies or
hard-core quiz addicts can easily drive away most stalwart drinkers.
Even the hardened regulars will eventually twig what's going on and
find a new drinking place. And don't forget your own behaviour. If
you are drunk and abusive often enough, quarrel loudly with your
partner, annoy the staff and support the wrong teams you will be
half-way there. Nowadays, licensing hours vary a lot between pubs.
That makes it easy to reduce your hours and make them really random.
You could put up posters with misleading opening hours, but in
general it's better not to show them at all. Don't advertise your
prices either, so it's a shock when they come to pay. If you are
required to be open a minimum number of hours, try all-day opening
from 10.30 am on Mondays or Tuesdays. That will mean you can close
from 2 to 7 at weekends when there might be trade about. You'll have
to employ some staff – you won't want to face what's happening in
the pub too often. Make sure they are ugly, too stupid to steal from
the till, and speak no English. Encourage them to chat in the corner,
smoke and play loud music. If you fail to train them in dispense,
the customers will eventually get fed up with waiting or getting the
wrong order. One tip I gave him was to keep all the ice and clean
glasses in the cellar, and send the staff down for each one separately.
John came up with the idea of making sure that food service takes
all the staff away from the bar at busy periods – he was obviously
getting the idea.
Lastly, we tackled the question of the beer. Would you believe it,
people often choose to go into a pub to drink beer, rather than buy
it at the supermarket to drink at home. The council will probably
notice if you don't serve any. So I showed John some strategies
for quality, choice and price that should guarantee falling sales.
If you are going to run a failing pub, it's a good idea to have real
ale. It shows willing, and there's plenty that can go wrong. You
can annoy customers by serving them bad pints, and disappoint them
because the advertised beers aren't on. Bad cellarmanship is an art
worth learning: poor stock control gives you green or acidic beer;
lack of maintenance and cleaning gives that thick, cardboard taste
to the ale and subtle temperature control can make the beer frozen
or soupy – sometimes in the same glass. I recommended to John that
he put on at least ten beers to get publicity: if he served them
young, cold and under blanket pressure he might even get a cellar
award. The best way to build up a list is to buy whatever is cheap
from the wholesaler each week, and just leave it on. Even if the
beer runs out, you've still got the pump clip there. Remember to
fleece the customers that come in – it's not as if you are going
to see them again. As a specialist real ale bar you can charge top
prices. Just make sure you skim off the cash in the till so that
the money doesn't show up in the accounts. You probably didn't get
to the King's Head while John was in charge: it was only a few
weeks – the advertising and guide entries came through after it
had closed. But you can now put down a deposit on a flat in the
"King's Loft Apartments" development.
Reproduced from the Full Pint, Issue 7.
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