Hamish Champ: Will Wetherspoon's 99p pint herald the demise of the tie?

I might be wrong - let's face it, it wouldn't be the first time - but I reckon in years to come people might look back on JD Wetherspoon's 99p-a-pint move as a watershed for the industry.

True, the managed pub chain's decision to help its recession-stressed customers by slashing the price of some of its cask ale and other brands is currently raising the hackles of licensees operating near a Wetherspoon outlet.

Never mind the media frenzy around the move, tied licensees, many at the end of their tethers already, cannot just afford to cut prices to compete with Wetherspoon's aggressive pricing.

But with the gaze of politicians currently trained on the tie - and with business commentators in this last weekend's press raising questions about the leased/tied model yet again - the 99p pint could be the catalyst for change with respect to the tied model that people, licensees and customers alike, are looking for.

Even friends of mine who know little about the economics of the pub trade are wondering why a pint of foaming cask ale costs nearly £3 in one boozer when another merely yards away is selling exactly the same product for less than a quid.

For many people the economics just don't seem to stack up anymore.

Change of one sort or another is surely coming. If pubcos don't want to have significantly larger numbers of closed pubs on their books - revaluations or no revaluations - then greater flexibility over the issue of the tie has surely got to be addressed.

Yes, this may or indeed will impact the whole rationale for the pubco's existence. But if they are confident that they can operate with greater flexibility for the benefit of their licensees and still make a return for their shareholders, well, this can't be a bad thing.

And if they can't? It begs questions as to their reason to exist in the first place.

Pubcos have stoutly defended the tie - wet rent set against low entry costs; levels of investment and the like. But to paraphrase Mandy Rice-Davis, they would do that, wouldn't they?

I have long argued for greater levels of support from pubcos for hard-pressed tied lessees and tenants. And pubcos have informed me that such support for deserving licensees is forthcoming. I imagine there will be ever more 'deserving cases' requiring help. And we shall see how helpful the pubcos are willing to be in the coming months.

As an aside, I spoke to one tied licensee last week who buys his cask ale from his landlord for 30p a pint more than Wetherspoon are currently selling it. He said he'd complained to his area manager about the deal.

The area manager had apparently suggested - his tongue no doubt wedged firmly into his cheek - the licensee should simply nip down the road to the nearest Wetherspoon outlet and buy a dozen or so pints of the stuff and bring them back to his pub on a tray.

That way, he'd save a packet and circumnavigate his pub's beer flow monitoring system at the same time.

Don't take this as me giving y'all ideas though…