Joseph Holt says pubs final bastion and its rooms offer

That’s the view of brewer and pubs and rooms operator Joseph Holt’s father and son bosses Richard and Andrew Kershaw.

Andrew, who joined the Manchester-based business six years ago, elaborates further.

“I almost see our pubs like the final bastion of the community centre,” he begins. “The working men’s club is on its knees, the RBL (Royal British Legion) is gone, that Connie club, that Labour club, that Liberal club, the Scouts hut, the library – all these amazing community buildings that were assets for everyone, they’re just not around anymore.

“It’s almost like pubs are the final element of that, that still exists. And that’s how we’ve totally changed our business, particularly in the past four or five years, outside of Covid.

“There used to be a very traditional man of a certain age who came into our pub, drank a gallon of bitter – amazing – and we still have those customers and they are absolutely welcome but we’ve had to change some of those pubs to accept the ‘Menopause Sucks’ group on a Monday night where we have 60-year-old women come in, have a nurse come down and give a presentation on menopause, etc.

“Five years ago, you probably would have said that’s never going to happen in a Joey Holt’s pub but we’re the kind of last place on the high street where that goes on and that’s so amazing and it’s about how can we get the Government to recognise we provide these amazing, inclusive spaces?

“That’s the future for the on-trade in the north-west because we don’t have the vibrancy that the south-east has in terms of that traffic footfall. We are running community pubs and that’s how we’re going to make them survive in the north-west, by being all things for all people.”

Rooms at the inns

One way the business is diversifying from its traditional brewing and pub-operating lines is by adding an accommodation offer.

Hotels by Holt is the name of the company’s foray into rooms.

Andrew explains: “Two years ago, we got the opportunity to buy a stand-alone Premier Inn that sat on one of our sites.

“We owned the pub and this Premier Inn was sat within the footprint of our car park. Obviously, it dates back to a time when the pub and the inn would have been one venture.

“So we had the opportunity to purchase it and we thought, if we’re ever going to learn about accommodation and how it’s going to work and how important an income stream do we see it for the future, this is it.

“Plenty of brewers similar to ourselves have really jumped into it. You look at the likes of JW Lees, Robinsons or St Austell for example, Shepherd Neame too... those guys have all got 400 to 500 bedrooms so we wanted to scratch that itch really and work out: how do you do it? Can we do it? Can we make money? And can we sell extra beer at our pub in front of it?”

To Andrew’s delight, they have worked out how to operate it and are able to make money from it.

Capital-hungry operation

“It’s incredibly capital-hungry though but it was really interesting learning some new skillsets about how to you run a business like that,” he adds.

“We’re still by no means amazing at it and are still getting stuff wrong but we’re getting more right than we are wrong and we’re enjoying it.”

He adds practices have been learned and Hotels by Holts is taking off after “not giving it the time of day” previously with the focus being on wet and food sales previously but there are plenty of sites with extra rooms or space where rooms could be built.

Father Richard, who joined the business in 1980 and became CEO in 2000, says: “What it’s given us is a third string to our bow with the great pubs we run, the expanding free trade and now we’ve got the hotel side of the business and that’s encouraging.

“Also because, we’ve all got to sadly admit, that alcohol is in decline nationally whereas actually more and more people are looking for accommodation so we see that as an expanding part of the future.”