Full steam ahead
His station buffet entertainment centres have hit the buffers, but Tony Brookes steams on. Phil Mellows reports.
Tony Brookes will miss the view from the Head of Steam at Euston Station. Sitting at the first floor window you can watch a continuous jostle of London buses outside the front of the terminus, a movement in which, you can sense from his furtive glances, he finds more meaning than most.
Logistics, the problem of getting something from one place to another, is Tony's thing, perhaps as much his thing as the beer for which he professes his most obvious passion and the business that has made him one of the industry's most singular personalities.
Last month, shortly after celebrating a quarter century in beer, he sold his Euston pub to brewer Fuller's. It marked the end of the unique vision behind Tony's company, Head of Steam, which he formed in 1994 with the idea of transforming Britain's station buffets into centres of entertainment and great beer.
The thinking seemed sound enough. British Rail, as it was then, owned many prime property sites perfectly postioned yet under-exploited as destination venues. Privatisation, its perils, and the subsequent restructurings and new managements slowed Head of Steam's progress almost to a halt, however. After originally aiming to grow by five pubs a year it now seems that even Tony's enthusiasm for the project, his head of steam, so to speak, has fizzled out.
The Euston pub made little sense without the company's nationwide ambitions coming to fruition - it was 300 miles from Tony's HQ in Hexham, Northumberland, and not much nearer to the other houses in the estate - railway pubs at Liverpool and Huddersfield and three more in Newcastle, two of them music venues.
For many in business this would be what you call a failure. But that's not a concept that fits this entrepreneur's eccentric career, nor his unconventional business philosophy.
"I'm someone who likes to be at the front edge of things," he says. "For me it's not what's most profitable, it's what's most interesting.
That was evident from the start, when Tony left his job at the National Bus Company to open a real ale off-licence in cask-starved Newcastle in June 1980. He had been a member of the Campaign for Real Ale since almost the beginning and giving up a steady career to work in what he describes as "the real ale movement" was more a crusade than a business decision.
"It was really exciting," he recalls. "And we made an enormous difference to the cask beer market."
Tony's first shop offered 25 real ales on draught plus imported beers and he used a van to wholesale them to other off-licences. Legendary Yorkshire Heroes (LYH), as he called the firm, quickly became a chain of five shops. But soaring interest rates - blamed on the Prime Minister of the day, affectionately referred to by Tony as "that old bitch" - forced him to exit retailing and focus on the wholesaling.
"We opened up the North East to real ales from all over the country," he says. "I'm a transport planner by profession and the essence of beer distribution is control - you have got to get your empties back."
LYH anticipated the guest beer clause that was to come with the 1990 Beer Orders by setting up guest ale schemes for big brewery managed house chains, Scottish & Newcastle (S&N), Vaux and Tetley's among them.
"It was a revolutionary idea at the time and it helped persuade them they had to be proper retailers, maximising their profitability by offering other beers and making their pubs more attractive to the public," he says.
At that point Tony was inspired to try retailing himself and partnered Hartlepool's Camerons Brewery in the creation of the Tap & Spile concept. He bought 18 pubs from S&N but sold out to Century Inns in 1994. "It was an interesting experience but trade was really rough," he confesses.
By that time he had also got out of wholesaling, selling that side of the business to The Beer Seller. "I realised there were only going to be three major wholesalers in the country and we were not going to be one of them."
All this time, however, Tony had been pursuing a third business interest - property development - and from this emerged Head of Steam.
While he might have given up on the ambition to make Britain's railway stations "destinations in their own right", the retail principles that shape Tony's pubs remain.
"We plan to be the best in each market and to offer people something different," he explains. "We are completely free-of-tie and that's so rare these days. I think big companies assume their customers will accept whatever they put on the bar, but I believe we have a range of products that can really attract customers."
A typical Head of Steam line-up will include eight or 10 cask ales, one or two real ciders plus imported beers. Like other cask ale specialists, Head of Steam's cask beer sales are up, bucking the overall market trend. The chain is famous for its beer festivals - where Tony's logistical expertise comes into play again.
It's not just about beer, though. The soft drink range includes the upmarket Fentimans juices.
"It's about quality and variety," Tony continues. "We don't buy things because they're cheap. You have to focus on what the customer wants."
Head of Steam will also continue to expand the entertainment aspect of the offer, especially in Newcastle where the Cluny is established as a breeding ground for new bands and has just been refurbished to improve the audience experience.
Charity is also important to Tony. This month he is riding a Harley-Davidson across the US to raise £10,000 for WaterAid, his favourite cause, and his pubs play their part in the fund-raising too.
"I will keep doing things differently, keep things interesting, with quality running through it," he promises. "The payback I get is seeing people enjoying themselves.
"I'm not a conventional industry guy," he adds, and for once you feel that Tony Brookes has understated his case.
Pictured: Tony Brookes outside the Cluny - in July he organised a petition to block Newcastle City Council's plan to build homes next to the music venue.
