City pub fosters festive spirit

A previous Great British Pub Award winner, (GBPA) the site celebrated it’s Best Pub Garden ​success this year at the awards, held in Manchester on Tuesday September 17.

Originally a car park, the garden at the Myrtle Tavern is currently comprised of two tiers, with capacity of up to 400 people in the bottom tier​, the garden offers a play area for children, a wild life pond and also extends to the surrounding woodland. The outside space has been transformed over a span of fourteen years and is carefully kept by gardeners throughout the varying seasons.

Innovative thinking

The Morning Advertiser​ spoke to Scott Westlake, owner of the Myrtle Tavern to find our more around the venue’s trading updates since its win and understand any future plans for the site. Westlake stated: “We utilised social media during the night of the awards and on the Friday and Saturday of that week we saw loads of people coming down to the pub. We had people coming down to say well done and also newer people checking us out too. That week we really rode the wave.”

Westlake described imminent general interaction with the site as positive, however after a turn of bad weather, trade appeared to dip after the awards. He addressed the process of turning to more “outside the box” methods of thinking when promoting the site. He added: “A way we looked at increasing advertising was by hiring out mobile billboards which we printed images of the pub and the awards on to and then planted them around Leeds.” 

“We had them parked up and they appeared to generate a lot of interest online and through bookings on the website.” Westlake described applying both GBPA logos and spinning pictures of the garden  around Leeds. With 50% of the site’s budget utilised for Christmas advertising and the remaining 50% used for advertising garden space. Both methods if marketing the venue, seemingly having positive effect on consumer engagement.

Varied events

As the colder months draw in, Westlake outlined the Christmas plans set out for the site. “We’ve built a brand new section of our website dedicated specifically for Christmas, events can be found easily there which we hope will improve engagement and boost trade.” He continued, "One of our events includes having real reindeers in our garden space and we’re also fostering a Santa clause theme as well”  He explained that during Christmas and the harsher winter periods, the site utilises a marquee, a space designated specifically for hosting consumers in an outdoor environment.

Speaking on the importance of celebrating staff talent at the site, he said: “ One of our staff members is very artistic and she designs our Christmas cards each year so this year, the Christmas card is actually being hand made and designed.” He continued: “The card image will be our garden with a Narnia, winter theme too for the colder months so that will be great to look out for.”

Westlake predicted that future trade for the sight should continue to see a boost as the warmer months of next year steadily roll in. He revealed “Having won best pub for garden, I believe as the summer starts again we will be able to ride off the success we had at this years awards.” Revealing that he believes trade “will only likely increase as time goes on”