Since 2002 pubs in the UK have been closing at the rate of between 22 and now 35 a week. 5 a day. In some areas main roads which had 3 pubs ( Copenhagen St in Islington ) not one remains open with all closing in the last 2 years ( 2 of those were venues - Red Eye and Lark )

I have a view that the reason that New Labour wants to price these pubs out of the marketplace ( with duty rises on beer ) is that the type of pub that is closing is the one that is a "community pub" where locals met and chatted ( a bit like the one in Eastender etc ) These are the ones hit by high prices and rent rises and red tape.

The ones that have continued in business tend to be City Centre bars which attract young and cash rich crowds to get drunk particularly at weekends and they tend to be big on space and low on seating. In these bars music is very loud and conversation is kept to grunts and smiles.

So what have NEW LABOUR achieved by this policy ?

To make sure that the General Public does not discuss how rubbish New Labour is when they go out. They have taken away the "bar room politics and religion" and have left vacuous drinking dens where consumption is everything.

So INTERNET blogs - you tube - this forum - are replacing places where people used to meet. The advantage of the NET over pubs is that we can live anywhere......the downside is that even if we ALL AGREE something is wrong with things because we are so spread out our influence is very small.

In the past Political - Social - religious movements were fermented in the British pub. New Labour has banished smokers outside the pub and the boards are going up on the remaining places.

Community is now a dirty word for New Labour. So no wonder we hide behind CCTV cameras - multiple locks and we fear for our teenage children as they walk the streets. A broken society created intentionally of which the PUB situation is yet another example of the breakdown. File next to the Post Office closures and so on.

Good post BR but a couple of things missing on pub decline.
I took a year off from music and writing in about 1990 and co-managed a lovely village pub.
We were pressurised by the brewery to do food, which was not a problem as we were good cooks.

Then we were further pressured by the brewery to only buy their suppliers foods and sell them, we felt quite insulted ,as our genuine home made food was selling rather well and at a high profit. I simply quit and went back to what I am still doing now.


We refused to serve food out of microwave as we were quite capable of making it. I sometimes wish that I had made more of a stand, but thinking back, all the brewery wanted was to gain the building and business back for "tenancy" status and we were one of their last "managed" houses.


The rut began at the aforementioned year and not just on the smoking ban, which of course killed a whole community of customers to their own abodes.

You could be onto something there, BR. However I think the overwhelmingly most significant reason for the demise of the pub is the smoking ban. I certainly don't go out as much as I used to now I have had my human right to consume a legal product revoked.

In addition to your theory, I think the smoking ban was a governmental social experiment. Less then 25% of adults now smoke. I think this is the percentage at which a minority can be bullied and disenfranchised, whist unable to defend itself.

The government now knows it can put any similarly small group out on to the fringes of society at will, without as much as a murmur of protest.

I said this to non-smoking friends who supported the ban:-
"It could be you next"

They laughed at me, but it's only a matter of time.

The trouble is with banning anything, as in the case of this discussion, smoking, it just gets turned into a rebellious thing and all starts up again from scratch.

Some of the young bands that I manage I had just as well put on in a beer garden to keep all of their followings there at all times, but then of course the difficulty in obtaining an outdoor music licence is ridiculous also.

There must be many reasons why some pubs close, not least due to cheaper supermarket booze and large screen TVs in the home.

In my local area not one pub has suffered or closed since the smoking ban. Our community is still thriving.

Previous posters have covered the principal reasons for the demise of the British pub; as Mart says, breweries are getting greedy.

However, there is an exception; one chain of pubs is expanding almost daily - in terms of outlets, turnover etc.

This is Wetherspoons.

OK, not the preferred choice of all. But what a simple business plan - opening in disused banks, churches, theatres, showrooms, cinemas etc. All in town centres.

Walk into any now - they open at 9am (until midnight/1am) - and most will be very busy serving food and drink at very competitive prices.

Maybe not for the traditionalist - but with over 700 pubs (built up over a short number of years) trading on a winning formula - they must be doing something right compared to those closing at a rate of 5 a week !

Wetherspoons employ almost 20,000 people in nearly 800 locations. Most are J D Wetherspoon pubs and often called 'The Moon under Water' - after George Orwell's famous piece.

Turnover is around

I HATE Wetherspoons. They are the MacDonalds of the pub industry and that's an intriguing point made there... it's true... every Wetherspoons I can think of usually is on the same block as a MacDonalds or across the road from one. Never noticed that until now.

Their food is shite and I find the places lacking in atmosphere. They're like cattle markets on busy days... and on and on they continue to breed and expand. Very worrying. They don't get my custom and pals have literally had to drag me into them because they all think it's cool and I end up looking like the anti-social awkward one.

A Wetherspoons point, which I can`t state as a fact but seems likely, is that the reason they sell reduced price beer , I am told, is that it is short dated produce, which of course, if true, is a UK disease of throwing things out that are perfectly alright, if true in this case of course, which I must underline by this statement.

I admit that I use Wetherspoons because they are cheap. The food is very poor but the price does make up for that - it is McDonalds pricing in a pub environment. I would say Wetherspoons is preferable to the American Style Stand up bars which have grown up all around the UK.

I still think that if NEW LABOUR did not tax beer so much then the Country Local would still exist.

In regards to the "change" argument - why does EVERYTHING have to change ? Surely if something is good then it does not need to change that much.

I cant think of a more stunning experience than going out to an old village pub with oak beams and roaring fire eating local produce including Steak and drinking excellent wines and beers - and having the chance to chat and discuss.

Sometimes we dont appreciate the good things that are not that expensive which we have in the UK. We seem to allow our theatres ( Astoria - Hammersmith Palais ) be ground into the dirt in order to build more faceless office blocks in the name of progress. Our pubs are equally being destroyed in the name of change and progress.

In 20 years time our only going out experience will be the "Arena" one - with all the rubbish that brings ( dare I say it a USA version of the UK ) and this will be high priced.

For those of us who dont have great amounts of disposable income or dont like hanging out with 20,000 others for a night out - or like seeing the face of the performer rather than having to watch a video screen of them - then we will have no where to go.

Progress can be brilliant.......but the UK pub should be saved as should these wonderful venues that are being destroyed almost annually.

Ah yes...'the old village pub with oak beams and roaring fire.'

These are the ones that are closing almost daily because very few are going into them; most - but, admittedly, not all - have had their day.

Chavs use a lot of them during the day...putting many of us off.

Wetherspoons also have chavs; but at 9.30 this morning, I counted 68 of them (and others) in a Surrey spoon - just up from the station and near McDonalds.

No other pub in this typical suburban/commuter town was open or even had its lights on. Of this town's other 11 pubs, why would just one not try early opening to compete with JDW ?

Five of them open at noon ! Change and improve - or die.

The local Wetherspoons is right next-door to McDonalds!

Anyone know of one that isn't?

Exactly the same reason why your butcher gave up and your fishmonger.

The TESCO ISATION of the High Street.

Buy in bulk offer the food or drink at loss leader prices meaning that an individual pub will not make money.

If the other pubs opened then they would make no money because Breakfast market is limited and with 70+ already loyal to Spoons I would say they are making a wise decision.

I use SPOONS ! because it is cheap. But I can assure you that a real country pub is far superior and you come home with a real glow and smile because the atmosphere is generally incredible. That is why people like MANDY had holiday homes in places like FOY so they could afford to get away from the "cheap" SPOONS crowd like me !!!

Dont confuse quality with number. We all agree most people drive a ford or whatever and not Ferraris but does that make the Ferrari inferior ?

For a village or a community then the loss of a pub is a major problem. Perhaps you have never visited a village or spoken to anyone who lives outside a big city. Try it - you will be suprised how nice rural people actually are ! Honest !! They are not the raving FOX killers that New Labour have "spun" about them.

BR. I think what's being said, quite rightly, is that Wetherspoons have a successful formula (see their share price). Cosy rural pubs (at least some) ARE better - and can replicate a lovely day in old England; but, they must improve to survive. In NYC, pubs/bars serve good and fast breakfasts...just like Tim Martin's lot; they wouldn't survive otherwise - as its gives them an early start. UK publicans have sleep in their eyes at noon.

If there was a market that made money from breakfast then I would agree.

I spoke to a manager of a large pub in the West End that opens for Breakfast. He says that they lose money on it because people are usually in a hurry and that he thinks it is not worthwhile........

So just because in some locations Spoons clean up - that is not the general case.

Pubs are not breakfast bars. They used to be places to go and socialise - to talk. That sort of conversation is now not profitable. Pubs need to sell so much beer and food and whatever in order to just survive. They have been squeezed out by taxation in the main ( and that has come mainly by Gordon Brown who has lifted the tax on beer in pubs EVERY budget)

Yes country pubs are better - but not only that Spoons will no doubt be closing pubs eventually - possibly in the next 2 years because even their pubs will suffer because of the taxation on beer. I ask you to wait and see - and the expansion of Spoons will no doubt grind to a halt as well this year because of this.

Sometimes it does not matter how much you do - if the dice are stacked against your business before you open your doors ( e,g costs are higher than revenues because of tax ) then you will fail.

Time on my hands. Visited the Horley and Redhill spoons this morning for two orange juices. The Jack Firman (H) had 87 customers and The Sun (R) 74; many were having breakfast.

On my 8 mile trip, no other pub was open.

A market for breakfast ? Yes - there is one. Even if its the liquid kind.

Predictions of the JWD demise are premature; they had one pub in 1979; they now have over 800 outlets and are now moving into the low budget hotel market (similar to Premier Inns, Ibis etc.)

Change is part or their ethos - and is the reason for their continued success.

In the two locations I mentioned (for example), JDW is open in one (H) for a year - and in the other for 10; in both towns, they are by far the biggest operator and the Horley venue is geared for music and dancing, at weekends.

Not your traditional British pub, just more successful ?

The Swan (Wetherspoon pub - centre of Weymouth) was very busy when I passed at about 10am. Could have been close to 100 people in there drinking coffee or something stronger, as well as having breakfast.

JWD's are now all having a two week Beer Festival where 50 different beers are available from all over the world.

Promotions are always on and they are very quick to display their awards from CAMRA, local authorities and the industry itself. Hygiene seems to always generate certificates/awards.

zooloo I have been thinking of an answer to your question. I know there's more - but the only place I can think of that has a Wetherspoon, and no McDonalds nearby, is Leatherhead.

Interesting that you mention the hygeine aspect of catering there Sheila, you would not believe how many people I know in catering that do not have one certificate and nobody has checked!
The basic food safety certificate is a rather easy one to achieve also.

To be fair to Wetherspoons (a place in which I have never been very comfortable in, in any region personally), you can actually take an early lunch if you have just worked nights and want to go to bed afterwards, but they are not the sort of places I would like to spend very long in.

As I have admitted already - I am a SPOONS fan. That is not the issue in this thread.

The issue was that literally 10% of our pubs are currently closed and many more going to close. I have checked with some friends in the industry and it is getting serious.

No one doubts that SPOONS with their wonderful leaflets offering breakfasts at 99p and incredibly cheap coffee are popular - I use them myself because of that.

They will slow down growth and they WILL start closing IF this recession deepens. No one will be immune. When the 100 people in the one you saw today lose their jobs then they will be having beans on toast at home and wont be going out.

In addition the SPOONS crowd is more coffee bar than pub clientele. I suggest you go in the same pub on a weekday evening - and yes I know that in some areas their curry nights and steak nights are extremely popular ( I have taken advantage myself in places in like Mansfield and Alfreton in the last year )

If we lose the community pub ( Spoons are City Centre pubs ) Then we lose more than a business and more that somewhere to eat and drink. This is the point of this thread.

Well done to SPOONS though for being so successful. An excellent business model and great prices for what they do and very reasonable.