London calling

How healthy is London's pub trade after July's bombings, asks Hamish Champ.

AC Nielsen's recent comments on the impact on Londoner's drinking habits of the July bomb attacks merit scrutiny.

The research outfit, which among other things tracks album sales in the US, has a Pubtrack service looking at sales data from the UK's managed pubs.

"There have been many reports," its commentary begins, "regarding a downturn in business for the pub trade in London [following the attacks]. However, latest data from AC Nielsen suggests otherwise".

Average weekly sales in managed pubs and bars in London for the year so far stand at around £32.8m, according to AC Nielsen. In the weeks of the bombing and the failed attack, sales stood at £32.5m and £33.9m respectively.

Such numbers appear to support the most bullish assessments of London pub-goers, thumbing their noses at the terrorists in order to down a pint or two.

AC Nielsen marketing director Andy Carrington even goes so far as to say that while there was a drop in sales in the week of July 7, sales here were actually better than other peaks and troughs seen in 2005.

"As testament to the 'stoic resolve' Londoners talked of having after 7/7, the week following the first bombings achieved the second highest peak of the year," he says, with sales "jumping to £35.6m, eight per cent higher than the weekly average figure for 2005".

On the face of it the figures can't be denied, but there are caveats. The research assessed the Greater London area, but look at the specific areas affected by the attacks and a different picture emerges. West End retailers have been calling for help in getting people back into the area and spending again while fewer people are travelling on the Tube, particularly at the weekend.

Talk to pub and venue operators and you will find business is down. Not out, but definitely down. "Our pub business was down between 20 and 30 per cent [in the aftermath] and is now off around 12 per cent year-on-year," said Alex Salussolia, managing director of Glendola Leisure and head of Westminster Licensees' Association. "It picked up after the July 7 attack, but the July 21 attempts hit hard."

Glendola operates tourist and family-friendly venues in the heart of the West End such as the Rainforest Café and Mr Salussolia says such enterprises are suffering. He adds that he will have to have a "fantastic Christmas" to get back to initial projections for the year. It would only take another attack to seriously throw his and many other businesses off kilter, he believes. "Yes," he says, "there are people out in the West End, but it's quieter than it's been in a long while."

Meanwhile, Mitchells & Butlers, which runs large venues such as All Bar One, notes that AC Nielsen's figures cover the "whole of the London TV region and do not focus on the West End and City areas that have been targeted by the bombers and are those more directly exposed to the threat".

Pubs in outer London report a rise in trade, anecdotally, perhaps because people are making their way home to what they perceive as the relative safety of their own "neck of the woods".

While AC Nielsen accepts the data looked at London overall and that "some very central establishments may have been affected more than average", it adds somewhat bizarrely that the post-bombing declines in trade correlated "directly with a drop in average temperatures. It seems the weather...has a greater capacity to affect British habits than these terrorists do".

Frankly, "carrying on" is less about a "Blitz spirit" and more to do with having little choice but to get on with it, however fearful we may be. While drinking in West End pubs might not be currently high on everyone's agenda, make no mistake, central London outlets will pick up, in time. For now though, many people remain understandably uneasy.