Knockout stages of Euros delivers for pubs
Data from Oxford Partnership’s Market Watch has shown the key importance of matches involving England and Scotland in driving footfall and sales.
In Euro 2020 (which took place in June 2021), all the biggest sales came from games featuring a home nation side and, in the group stages, weekly sales shifted to be largely on game days but the real boost came in the knockout rounds and there appears to be no change to this trend in Euro 2024.
In the group stages, England games drove sales of 25.6m pints, which is an additional 203 pints per pub leading to a 31.5% uplift in draught sales versus the same days average in 2024. This means pubs earned an additional £925 per pub in revenue.
Meanwhile, in Scotland, Market Watch found a similar impact with an additional 170 pints per pub leading to a 21.9% uplift in draught sales versus the same days average in 2024.
Group game stats
When it came to each England group game, an extra 50 pints (+18%) were sold per pub in England during the Serbia game on Sunday 16 June versus the same day in 2023, an extra 77 pints (+49%) during the Denmark game on Thursday 20 June and an extra 76 pints (+36.2%) were sold during the Slovenia game on Tuesday 25 June.
Meanwhile, when Scotland played, pubs saw an additional 67 extra pints (+18.8%) were sold per pub in Scotland during the Germany game on Friday 14 June, 90 extra pints (+48.4%) were sold during the Switzerland game on Wednesday 19 June and 13 extra pints (+5.6%) during the Hungary game on Sunday 23 June.
When England reached the last sixteen back in 2021, weekly sales grew by 3.6% and sales rose further during the knockout match with Slovakia on Sunday 30 June.
Real-time market intelligence business Oxford Partnership data found a staggering 11.4m pints were sold as pubs benefited from extra time after Jude Bellingham’s overhead kick revived not just the team’s hopes but also pubs across the country, with the prospect of a quarter final against Switzerland at 5pm on Saturday 6 July.
This resulted in average uplift of 55 pints per pub (v 2023) and an additional £261 in the till. England’s last-minute equaliser against Slovakia saw draught beer and cider sales grow by 22.4% v 2023, as 30 mins of extra time and the hopes of a nation kept consumers in pubs for longer as the nail-biting knockout game played out.
Almost all categories up
In terms of category performance, world lager rose by 36.2% and core lager was up 17.2%. Apple cider slightly suffered, declining by 3.0% while fruit cider was up 47.2%. The standout performance was stout, where sales lifted by 52.8% but it was a strong weekend for all major categories and a welcome boost for the on-trade.
Overall, footfall grew by 0.5% for the whole week compared to 3.2% on Sunday. City centres continued to suffer at a total week level down 2.1% compared to growth in suburban and rural areas. For Sunday, the key footfall growth happened in suburban areas, where 4.1% growth was observed, rural areas also benefited with a 2.4% boost while city centres saw a marginal increase of 0.9%
Dwell time grew by 9.4% on Sunday, driven by suburban locations, which were up 14.6% and rural outlets grew by 14.3%, as average overall dwell time grew to 138 minutes per occasion. City centres benefited the least but still saw a 4.5% increase in dwell time per occasion.
Oxford Partnership CEO Alison Jordan said: “We are delighted to now really start seeing the positive effects of this tournament on the on-trade.
“With everyone cheering England on for the result we all want on Saturday, we are genuinely hopeful for a bumper summer of sales to continue.”
