Not happy!

StevieJ

lostinrates wrote: »

Hmm...sort of..not exactly though, but I also am prepared to admit I'm not infallible or always right. which is pretty rare around here.

Was that in the other place

blueboy43

PasturesNew wrote: »

Chip shops are gold mines. I remember years ago I had a friend who was a manageress of a chip shop. She said her boss had borrowed/paid £80k for it and paid off that debt in two years - and that was in about the mid 80s.

Everybody loves a good chip.

The downside is that you have to work in one yourself to make it sucessful (and stop the staff robbing you blind). You end up smelling of chips all the time.

blueboy43

Pobby wrote: »

Pub companies are in a world of debt. Hence rents being so high. Ah, the joys of the property boom. My guess is that it might be possible to use the back yard as parking, hence it might be converted to yet more flats. If not it will rot.

They pub co tried to sell it a few years back at a very reasonable ( not ) £350,000. Possibly squeeze 4 flats from it but at the going rate it would be unlikely to fetch anywhere near £200k. Conversion costs would far exceed current prices for flats.

Very sad.

Was it a tied pub ? Did they have to buy their beer from the Pub Co ?

It is the extortionate rents that Pub Co's charge that is killing small pubs and the fact that many rents also force the landlords to buy almost everything from the pub co.

The government consulted on banning upward only rent reviews about 6 years ago.
The idea was opposed by landlords / banks / developers.

Three of the impacts of upwards only rent reviews according to the consultation were;

* inflate property prices and distort investment choice, resulting in property
investment being favoured over more productive assets.

* distort the buy-versus-rent decision in favour of buying, resulting in a
largely closed market in freehold property. A ban would encourage investment
of institutional capital in trading companies owning their own property.

*Flexible rents would improve the efficacy of monetary policy and thus contribute to macroeconomic stability.

Naturally the government caved in and did nothing.

Utterly gutless and corrupt.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

blueboy43 wrote: »

Very sad.

Was it a tied pub ? Did they have to buy their beer from the Pub Co ?

It is the extortionate rents that Pub Co's charge that is killing small pubs and the fact that many rents also force the landlords to buy almost everything from the pub co.

Your statements are broadly untrue.

I did a fair bit of research into this when I looked into buying or leasing a pub with a mate a few years ago, and I still keep an eye on the sector as I own shares in some of the companies within it.

The recent government inquiry found that tied pubs pay an average of £12,000 per year more than free of tie pubs in total. But anyone can go and buy a free of tie pub, if they have the money to do so. You can also go and rent a pub free of tie from any one of thousands of independant landlords.

But most people do not have the money to do so. So they end up having to be subsidised in by getting a tied lease. Nothing wrong with that, but you will pay more, and rightly so.

In my opinion, you'd need to have a really strong, and probably a niche market business case, to think getting into a pub was a good idea in the middle of a recession, with Wetherspoons selling pints for 99p, the smoking ban and cheap supermarket booze having killed a lot of the trade, etc....

Unless you really knew what you were doing in terms of relevant business experience, and had substantial funding behind you, it would be difficult to compete with the big boys. I rather suspect most small landlords that are failing had neither.

But anyone entering into such an arrangement has to read and sign the contract, knowing full well the costs they will be paying. Nobody forces them to do so. Inevitably, a lot of enthusiastic amateurs will try, and fail, to run pubs. Those people then want to blame the pub co for their failure. But the reality is somewhat different.

The smoking ban, cheap supermarket booze, and recession are what is killing pubs. The pub co's are no angels, but they're not the main reason.

The government consulted on banning upward only rent reviews about 6 years ago.
The idea was opposed by landlords / banks / developers..

Naturally the government caved in and did nothing.

Utterly gutless and corrupt.

Upward only rent reviews sound bad, I'll give you that. Most rent in a commercial setting is adjusted annually based on RPI or CPI. With both measures having been negative recently, I don't see how they can justify increasing rent.

Actually, just checked, it seems they are already ending them.

http://www.thepublican.com/story.asp?storycode=66215

iolanthe07

Amazing that we've got to post 25 and no one has mentioned the smoking ban.......

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Pobby wrote: »

There is a Witherspoons in walking distance but that`s not a pub in my eyes. However that`s the way things are going.

Wetherspoons are the Lidl or Aldi of the pub trade. Nobody can compete on price with a Wetherspoons, and it is putting a lot of locals out of business. The volume deals they get are simply impossible for the small guys to touch.

This is no different to what happened with small high street shops in the 1980's when the supermarkets started dominating small towns. Ultimately the consumer wants to pay less, which is why these places thrive.

Pub companies are in a world of debt. Hence rents being so high.

Again, we researched this when we were looking at taking a pub on. Pub rents are set as a percentage of the pubs turnover. They are not dependant on property value or the debt of the pub co.

They pub co tried to sell it a few years back at a very reasonable ( not ) £350,000. .

Pub prices, like any trading business, are set not based on property value but on a multiple of EBITDA. Unless the pub is closed, with no hope of re-opening. It would then revert to commercial property value.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

iolanthe07 wrote: »

Amazing that we've got to post 25 and no one has mentioned the smoking ban.......

:rotfl:

See post 25......

And just to clarify, I do think it is sad so many pubs are closing.

But the recession, smoking ban, and cheap supermarket prices are far more to blame than the "greedy pub co's" IMO.

I also suspect it will get worse, now that the government is also on an anti-alcohol mission. If people drink less, then more pubs will close.

But such is the nature of life.

Times change, people do drink less, beer sales are in decline, and have been for many years. Smoking bans happen. Older customers die off, and are replaced by young folk looking for restaurants and wine bars, not local pubs with no food.

You can't blame it all on corporates, debt, and property prices. Despite the leanings of some on this board to do so. Those are issues, sure, but only a small part of the bigger problem.

Conrad

I hear this sentiment all the time on my local village website - the very same people bemoaning the closure of the pub or post office are the very same that don't support thier establishments.

Tis the same barmy logic where people happily shop in Tesco's and then tsk tsk when the local butcher closes - what is this wierd mentality all about?

Is it the same faux persona that applauds funds for the NHS but them moans thier Tax is too high?

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Conrad wrote: »

I hear this sentiment all the time on my local village website - the very same people bemoaning the closure of the pub or post office are the very same that don't support thier establishments.
?

Well said.

You can't sit around the house enjoying cheap beer from the supermarket, or have a few before you go out to keep your costs down, and then moan when the local pub closes.

Bizzare mentality. But we've all seen people like that.

Sites like MSE have played a part in the downfall of independant hospitality venues as well. All those restaurant vouchers, etc, may be good for the consumer, but they are killing the small restaurant trade by discouraging loyalty and competition through quality & service, not price.

Ultimately, the ones that survive and thrive will be the lowest common denominator. The "pile em high and sell em cheap" warehouses like Wetherspoons. Soul destroying, bland, corporate, characterless places.

But they are cheap......

lostinrates

I was in our local yesterday. I'm pleased its doing well, its well used by the village (it has no competition in the village) and it provides a venue for lots of things. The new landlord has done a lot, a LOT, to improve a pub with a goo reputation despite some less ...great...Landlords. Now, what we were all saying yesterdy, as has already been pointed out, its become a village restaurant with a bar, not a pub that serves food in feeling. The bar is the original period bar, tiny...and the extentons have all been to encompass a restaurant that is packed with people coming from miles around.

Most important to me, is the LL allows dogs in a again, previous LLs stopped this. Of course you have to squeeze them into the tiny bar, but for those of us who would have to walk a couple of miles to the local, combining it with a dog walk rally makes sense...because of course, the real issue here is that we can't both support pub actively and adhere to drink driving laws. Although I did notice that two soft drinks and a cider took by far the bulk of a tenner......so...maybe it can!