So much for the theory tell us about the practice.
After years of wondering about what impact the smoking ban would have on pubs in England, licensees are finally able to deal in fact and explore new ideas for making trade work under the ban.
This is the basis for the series of licensee forums The Publican is hosting around the UK this year.
For more than 80 licensees who joined in the discussion at York Racecourse last week, there was no shortage of advice, experiences and opportunities to discuss.
Speakers ranging from West Yorkshire licensee Andrew Russell to brewer Scottish & Newcastle (S&N), from the industry's clean-air initiative AIR to York City Council, all lined up to offer participants experiences and topics to debate about trading under a smoking ban.
Three new opportunities were also set out for pubs to grab hold of and attract some new customers with this autumn from National Quiz, Ladbrokes Pub Poker and RacingUK.
A common message from all licensees included was that they can make the ban work if they adapt their businesses accordingly, despite the distorting effect of this summer¹s terrible weather on trade.
Andrew Russell of the Black Horse in Clifton, near Brighouse in West Yorkshire, told attendees how he had taken the pub forward with a smoking ban in March and how neither he nor his customers had looked back since, with a number giving up smoking or cutting down since the ban.
A crucial factor, said Andrew, had been to keep talking to his customers throughout the transition period, and keeping them on his side.
Martyn Goulding of the Original Oak in Headingley, Leeds, found Andrew¹s presentation particularly helpful. "I was interested in how his customer profile had changed with the ban, with fewer young people coming in, and he explained how pubs needed to be prepared to change their customer base to succeed after the ban," he said.
Goulding said he also took a lot home from what AIR director Oliver Griffiths had to say at the forum. "I'm a great believer in the fact that service is the absolute key to this," he declared. "As Oliver said, we' ve got to make the outside as good as the inside I say that to my staff every day."
Early days
Speaking at the event, Richard Sullock, customer marketing manager for S&N UK, said early experiences of the ban in England had confirmed what he had suspected the winners of the ban so far were "food-led outlets, and anywhere catering for females, couples and families". The pubs best equipped to succeed were those that had ensured they ticked at least one of these boxes.
Sullock explained how the brewer had factored in a £10m net negative impact on profit due to the smoking ban this year prompting at least one licensee at the forum to wonder why it was that pub companies weren;t factoring a similar drop into their own targets for the year, and cutting rents accordingly.
- Some of the brewer's key conclusions so far were:
- pubs needed to ensure easy access from the bar to the outside area, to
- make sure that drinks sales don¹t suffer if smokers are too far away
- smokers are remarking that they are happy to
- go outside to smoke but often comment
- on how they are losing thegroup conversation
many pubs are putting polite noise notices outside to minimise disturbance.
On this note, Ian Gray, a senior health and environmental officer at York City Council, said 12 pubs in the city were currently causing problems with noise but to date the council was taking a softly-softly approach to dealing with them. He was aware of just two incidences so far where a council officer had come across people smoking in pubs in the city.
Back to the future
Licensees were also warned that, where possible, they needed to Œfuture-proof¹ their businesses by making sure smoking shelters were some distance from their pub.
AIR¹s Oliver Griffiths told the forum that where once the government described the ban as being ³total², it was now using the word ³partial² suggesting there would be further restrictions to come, such as demands for no smoking immediately around the pub, when the law is reviewed in 2010.
In the meantime, licensees should think about putting extra emphasis on service to attract new customers, he continued. ³All the evidence from Ireland and Scotland is that for a period of three to six months a whole load of non-smokers suddenly go to pubs,² said Griffiths. ³You¹ve got to make the most of them when they come in.² Providing table service to outside tables had been proven to increase drinks sales by as much as 40 per cent, he declared.
The key for licensees was to ensure their outside area catered for everyone, not just smokers, and to ensure that even outside, where possible, there was a no-smoking area.
"In three years' time, you¹ll find a new reality, and you may find you wasted your money,² he said. ³If you provide mixed facilities, you¹ll have something everyone can enjoy, whether or not they smoke," he concluded.
The front three
Participants at the forum were also presented with three ideas aimed at taking pubs forward after the smoking ban.
RacingUK explained how it offers live coverage of every race at 30 racecourses in the UK, with a service that doesn¹t require a Sky subscription. Aimed at getting more people into pubs on weekday afternoons, and encouraging existing customers to stay longer, subscriptions have increased 50 per cent in the months following England¹s smoking ban.
Visit www.racinguk.tv
National Quiz is offering licensees the chance to lay on weekly, fortnightly or monthly pub quizzes, which will pit their customers against other pubs around the country for big cash prizes. The whole pub can signal its answers to multiple-choice questions in the internet-based quiz using colour-coded bats.
Visit www.nationalquiz.co.uk
Ladbrokespoker.com set out some of the new gambling regulations and the opportunities they offer for licensees by making it easier for them to lay on poker nights in the pub. The company is offering free pub poker packs to Publican readers, and inviting pubs to get their customers to represent them in the Ladbrokespoker.com Online Pub Poker Championship.
Visit www.thepublican.com/ladbrokes
Under starters orders
Two more licensee forums are under starter¹s orders in the South and in the Midlands. Visitors to each event can also enjoy an afternoon's racing.
September 26 Goodwood Racecourse, Chichester, West Sussex
October 10 Nottingham Racecourse, Colwick Park, Nottingham
Tickets, priced £20 (+VAT) each can be ordered online at www.thepublican.com/licenseeforums, or by calling 07714 106072.