Every year, the PMA team compiles the definitive list of the sector’s power players – those who have helped to shape the trade in the past 12 months. And this year – as in 2010 and 2011 – it is headed by Tim Martin
Editor Rob Willock says: “It was hard to look far beyond Tim Martin in our search for the most influential person in the pub industry. He may even be our only true ‘personality’ in terms of public recognition – the Sir Richard Branson or Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou of the on-trade. Surely it can only be a matter of time before a knighthood comes Martin’s way.
“Martin is a big character, both literally (at 6ft 6ins tall) and instantly recognisable by his trademark mullet haircut. This qualified barrister is a man of conviction, if not high fashion, and has combined a canny flair for business (he built JD Wetherspoon from a single site in 1979 to a managed estate of 870+ pubs today) with an instinct for a popular campaign.”
Martin is a passionate campaigner for a reduction in VAT for hospitality businesses – to level the playing field with supermarkets – and an outspoken critic of minimum unit pricing for alcohol.
His late support for the campaign against the Beer Duty Escalator campaign guaranteed it column inches in the tabloid press, and arguably helped secure the historic tax reversal.
The Top 50 Power Players list in full
- Tim Martin, chairman, JD Wetherspoon
- Ted Tuppen, chief executive, Enterprise Inns
- Stephen Billingham, chairman, Punch Taverns
- Alistair Darby, chief executive, Mitchells & Butlers
- Rooney Anand, chief executive, Greene King
- Ralph Findlay, chief executive, Marston’s
- Andrew Griffiths MP, chairman, All Party Parliamentary Beer Group
- Jonathan Paveley, chairman, Admiral Taverns
- Mike Benner chief executive, CAMRA
- Steve Richards, chief executive, Novus
- Mike Tye, chief executive, Spirit Pub Company
- Jonathan Neame, chief executive, Shepherd Neame
- David Forde, managing director, Heineken UK
- Brigid Simmonds, chief executive, BBPA
- Simon Emeny, chief executive, Fuller Smith & Turner
- Greg Mulholland MP, chairman, All Party Parliamentary Save the Pub Group
- David McHattie, chief executive, ALMR
- Stephen Gould, chief executive, Everards
- Ian Payne, chairman, Stonegate Pub Company
- Keith Knowles, chief executive, Beds & Bars
- David Rey, managing director, Sky Business
- Paul Walsh, chief executive, Diageo
- Marc Watson, chief executive, BT Vision
- Tim Hulme, chief executive, BII
- James Baer, managing director, Amber Taverns
- James Staughton, managing director, St Austell Brewery
- Scott Waddington, chief executive, SA Brain
- Peter Marks, chief executive, Luminar
- Stephen Goodyear, chief executive, Young’s & Co
- Stewart Glendinning managing director UK & Ireland, Molson Coors
- John Longden, chief executive, Pub is the Hub
- Simon Clarke, founder, Fair Pint
- Benet Slay, chief executive, Carlsberg UK
- Richard Bailey, chief executive, Thwaites
- Inge Plochaet, president, AB Inbev
- Andrew Boyd, business unit director, Britvic GB
- Billy Buchanan, chief executive, LT Pub Management
- Rufus Hall, chief executive, Orchid
- Gary Haigh, managing director, Miller Brands UK
- Jacques Borel, founder, VAT Club
- Paul Flaum, managing director, Whitbread Restaurants
- Roger Moxham, chief executive, Bramwell Pub Company
- Peter Hansen, founder, Sapient Corporate Finance
- Paul Wells, chairman, Charles Wells
- Julian Grocock, chief executive, SIBA
- John Leslie, chief executive, Intertain
- Lynn D'Arcy, managing director, Trust Inns
- Jon Collins, chief executive, CGA Strategy
- Mark McQuater, chief executive, Inventive Leisure
- Jillian McLean, founder, Drake & Morgan