McIntyre investigates...

Looked in the mirror lately? Can't face it? Perhaps you ought to see a doctor. A pub doctor.

Joining pub doctor Clive McIntyre on his rounds in the Midlands it quickly becomes clear that a lot of licensees are in need of treatment. Looking for a hostelry where we could sit down for a chat early doors was a challenge in itself. From the car it was impossible to tell what was open - and this was within walking distance of a major tourist attraction where people would be looking for a coffee.

Clive sighs. "This is a big thing with me at the moment. Licensees are switching off lights to save money - but if you do that you look shut! That's financial suicide. You can't hide yourself away," he says.

And he should know. For 10 years he was tenant of the Hawk & Buckle in Etwall, Derbyshire, and is just easing himself out of that award-winning business to concentrate on pub medicine.

It started when his landlord, Marston's, asked him to mentor new tenants through their first months in charge of a pub, and it's grown into a full-time job, with Marston's as his biggest client.

The idea is that Clive can use his experience and knowledge to help licensees get their businesses back on track before it's too late - and in these stricken times he's a busy man. As someone who has been a publican himself, he believes he is easier to talk to than the pubco's business development managers.

Close-up examination​

"If you're struggling it's not easy to talk about it," he says. "There is embarrassment there. You'll not admit it to a brewery rep you don't see very often, or an area manager who may not have had a pub themselves.

"You could examine your pub yourself but you don't see how it looks to customers. One thing you can try is taking a photo of it or looking at it in a mirror. It's my job to do that in more detail. I'm not the brewery headmaster telling you off. I just want to help you look at your business from another angle."

The difficult thing about running a pub is that there's so much that can go wrong.

Interestingly, though, Clive has discovered a common fault. It's not that pubs with problems have nothing to offer customers. It's that they aren't quite clear who those customers might be. "Pubs are struggling because a lot of the time they don't know who their market is and they end up giving out mixed messages," he says.

"The danger is that they'll see their sales falling and they'll try everything to get them back. They've not realised they need to attract their chosen customer base. Shout out about your strengths

"There is a British reticence, too, when it comes to shouting about our strengths," he adds. "We're shy about telling people about our standards. We don't promote them.

"It's a blinkered approach - a failure to market your business. It's good to have standards. But in a declining market you can't sit back and rely on high standards alone."

Clive draws a trapezium shape to illustrate the fundamental principle of business success, writing the word 'costs' across the narrower end at the top and 'customers' along the wide end at the bottom. The trick is to keep your customer base broad enough so you have enough money coming in to pay your costs, he explains. "And that means you've got to grow that base to stay still - customers die.

"Licensees often don't think about having a growing business, and they'll go for safety and not take risks for fear of alienating their existing customers. Or they'll go for a customer base that's too large."

Clive also thinks that licensees can be too insular: "They see others as competition so they don't share ideas and they don't learn enough - you don't have to keep re-inventing the wheel!"

"The BII can give you priceless gems that are worth the price of membership alone, you can pick up ideas to drive up business and standards.

"And every licensee should make themselves step back from the pub and think about what they are doing. I always advise them to get their staff off-site for a chat, perhaps to have a look at the competition - and that might be a garden centre!

Ultimately, Clive concludes that there are always new customers to be won.

He says: "If three or four people a week come to you through a website and you can add three or four passers-by, three are coming in for events and three or four for your cask ale club, suddenly you're viable again."

A typical case for Clive McIntyre​

A call from Marston's will tell him about a pub that needs help. His work begins on the internet, researching demographics in the local area through Upmystreet.com, "to find out where the profits are going to come from".

He'll make a mystery visit, finding out how well the pub stands out among the competition, what it's like inside and what the welcome and service are like, coming to some conclusions about how the business might be refreshed and refocused.

Then Clive makes an appointment with the licensee to determine why the pub is trading as it is and whether the licensee has made a conscious decision about his target market. He'll find out what the pub does well and how it projects itself to the outside world. The meeting will also take in financial issues such as profitablity and stocktaking.

Having identified the pub's problems Clive will suggest a way forward and make a list of issues for the licensee's area manager and perhaps recommend specialist advice.

Finally it's up to the area manager to follow up and make sure with the licensee that the strategy is carried out.

…and the doctor's long-term prognosis​

"I believe this period will be a defining moment for the next era of pubs - a Darwinian evolution that will see the loss of the weak sites and a huge opportunity for those who adapt.

"But we must promote survival by diversity and not allow the individuality of pubs to die as they all try to become food-led. Niche marketing will be the way forward - great sites that serve a variety of markets."