The Upper Broughton pub, on the Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire border, is set to reopen on Monday 26 June – more than a year after it was forced to close – and, at the time, the owners were nervously waiting on a decision by its insurance company to accept liability.
Some £1.3m has been spent on the restoration and renovation of the pub following the fire, which was a result of laundry igniting in the tumble dryer.
Managing director of parent business The Cat & Wickets Pub Company, Harry Gurney, who has played cricket for England, Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire, explained how it felt to have the company’s first pub almost back online: “It’s a big relief because it’s been a long process and there are periods where you’re working on the finance behind the scene and liaising with insurers and periods where it feels a million miles away – but to be on the home straight is really exciting.”
Two big gastropubs
He continued: “In the interim, we’ve opened another pub (the Griffin) so we’ve gone multi-site and will now have two big gastropubs and we can’t wait to get stuck into that.”
On the recent opening of the Griffin in Swithland, Leicestershire, Gurney explained: “It’s open and it’s trading really well – it’s really surprised us actually. The Griffin is a really popular and iconic pub in Leicestershire where the previous operator ran it for 20 years.
“It was always extremely popular but perhaps they started to take their eye off the ball a little bit in the final few months before we took over but there’s still years and years’ worth of people who go there once, twice maybe three times a year. Some probably don’t know it’s changed hands and are now becoming customers of ours, so that’s nice.”
More regular custom
He continued: “There’s a lot of people who have no idea who Stuart Broad is, let alone Harry Gurney, but they turn up and like what they see and are becoming more regular customers. There’s more of a population density in the area, which is quite affluent.”
In October 2022, founder of Peach Pubs, Lee Cash, invested in The Cat & Wickets pubco. Broad, who also plays cricket for England and Nottinghamshire, praised the guidance of Cash at the time: “When Harry and I were learning our craft on the cricket field, the counsel of senior players was hugely valuable to us and we don’t think commerce is any different.
“Lee has already added significant value to our business, and we are excited to see how that develops further over the coming years.”
