Mark Daniels: Getting through to the general public

It strikes me that one of the biggest problems we face, an industry as a whole, is the lack of knowledge or understanding that the general public have with regards to our trade

Yes, newspapers and television channels are reporting the wider picture: that an average of 36 pubs a week are closing at the moment. Yes, they report that most of these closures are due to the landlords getting in to financial difficulty. Yes, one or two - depending on their mood - will lament the passing of the Great British Pub and yes we get one or two media personalities shouting that we should support our locals.

On the other hand, however, few of these reports give details on the issues behind why so many pubs are failing. The public, in general, simply doesn't understand us.

To so many, pubs are buildings that take gargantuan amounts of money, much of which they believe disappears in to the pockets of the publicans, who then run around pleading poverty. I wish this were the case.

Whilst campaigns to raise the minimum price of alcohol, ban the stealth accelerator on alcohol duty and to stop supermarkets selling vodka at prices cheaper than water are all admirable and worthy causes - each and every one of which, as a landlord, I support - perhaps we ought to be doing more to raise awareness amongst the general public as to the difficulties the pub trade faces.

It is abundantly clear to me when speaking with customers that many of them do not recognise or understand the plethora of problems behind each pub and, reading comments in response to some of the articles on this very website, this problem reaches very wide indeed. One commenter mentioned that pubs had only themselves to blame for their demise for voting in the smoking ban! I sincerely hope Mr Woods was trying to be funny, because if the general perspective is that pubs signed their own death warrants by agreeing to the ban we are in a lot more trouble than we actually think. We didn't ask for our smoking shelters or for our regulars to be encouraged to drink at home instead of in our businesses.

Equally incorrect is the perception of why pub prices are so much higher than the supermarkets. Whilst some do understand that you would expect to pay more for a drink in a social environment than you would at home, most can't figure out why we can't sell a pint for a pound if they can get a pint for 50p from Tesco. Many of the general public don't understand what the beer tie is, and even more find it incomprehensible that our cash & carry suppliers are still more expensive to the trade than Tesco is to the average Joe.

My mum asked me last month if I could supply the wine and cans of lager and bitter for my step-father's sixtieth birthday. "Mum," I said, sadly, "even if I sold it to you at cost, without the VAT on it, you'd still be better off nipping to Tesco and getting it from there."

Unfortunately, the supermarkets have got their clutches on the alcohol trade now. There's no doubt these establishments sell cheap booze as a loss-leader, but I suspect their powerful buying departments are also negotiating excruciatingly cheap deals from the breweries - and in order for the breweries to make the difference back, they are passing those costs directly to the on-trade.

Many of the general public are facing financial strife at the moment. The cost of petrol, oil, gas and electricity has all gone up tremendously this year - but it is often forgotten that businesses, big and small, have also had to account for these increases. Electricity rates have sky-rocketed this year; petrol eclipsed all known records; heating oil reached more than 60p a litre - these expenses, and the cost of staff, Sky, business rates, waste disposal charges (the list goes on) all have to come out of a pint that costs less than £3.00 and is already heavily levied with VAT and alcohol tax before its own cost is accounted for. It leaves little for the average publican to pay all those bills with.

My pub is still a convivial establishment and most publicans don't want to be seen as whiners - if my pub was making money hand over fist I would love to be able to support local events and establishments and I'd shout about it from the roof tops. I love Good News Stories and I believe hard-working people have the right to reward themselves.

Unfortunately, however, so many hard-working people in this industry are unable to do just that, and the general public simply don't understand why. Perhaps it's time we campaigned to them, so that they understand the pubs aren't the bad guys.