‘Hard month’ for pubs as UK’s dry January set to
be driest ever
Almost as many people said they had attempted to go
teetotal at the start of this year as in any of the previous 10 years
James
Tapper
Sun 28 Jan
2024 07.00 GMT
It is set
to be the driest January in living memory. Drinks sales in pubs and bars have
plunged. Rising numbers of people are drinking low or no-alcohol. And new data
indicates that even older people are joining teens and twentysomethings by
giving up booze. With three days to go, this has been a grim month for
publicans.
The British
Beer and Pub Association (BBPA) says pubs must adapt quickly by stocking more
“lo-no” options and opening their doors more regularly to give community groups
a cosy welcome on winter days.
“Most of us
want to compensate for our Christmas indulgence and January seems the perfect
time to do that,” said Emma McClarkin, the BBPA’s chief executive. “What we
want to get across is that we are the hub in the community, we are the heart of
the high street, and we’re the place people can go regardless of whether
they’re having an alcoholic beverage or not.”
Market
researcher CGA tracks drinks sales in pubs and bars every week and in the last
fortnight sales have been down by at least 7% compared with last year, with a
19% fall in sales of spirits last week.
The bad
weather and the economic climate are partly to blame, but the company’s
managing director Jonathan Jones said Dry January was also “making this a hard
month for pubs and bars”.
The dusty
bottle of Kaliber in an unloved corner is gone. Now drinkers can find crisp
lagers on draught, IPAs, weissbiers, pilsners, milk stouts and pale ales.
Alcohol
Change UK, which began the Dry January campaign 11 years ago, says a record
number of people have downloaded its Try Dry smartphone app. And a survey for
the BBPA last week showed that almost as many people said they had attempted
Dry January this year as in any of the previous 10. Of the 2,230 people
surveyed by Find Out Now for the BBPA, 263 (11%) took part and a third of those
were doing it for the first time.
Younger
people are, perhaps unsurprisingly, giving up drinking in larger numbers, the
survey showed. The tendency of so-called Gen Z to avoid drugs and alcohol has
been documented for years, to the annoyance of some of their redder-nosed
elders, and now about a quarter of under-25s do not drink at all, due to rising
awareness of alcohol’s effects on health and the fear of drunken exploits being
posted on social media.
Yet
substantial numbers of older cohorts have also put down their glasses, and one
of them is William Chase, the 64-year-old entrepreneur who founded Tyrrells
crisps and used to run Chase Distillery.
“I spent 10
years of my life frying crisps, and the next 10 years making spirits,” he said.
“I decided to quit alcohol and quit any toxins. Now I feel fantastic – trying
to turn the clock back.”
Chase sold
his distillery to Diageo in 2020, but said being in that industry meant he
became a “regular” wine drinker. Now he makes Willy’s ACV, a probiotic apple
cider vinegar.
“If you’re
making alcohol or saturated fat products you get to see what they do. What I do
now – it’s not as easy to sell health as it is to sell snacks, but on the
conscience side of things [it’s easier].”
Last year
509 pubs shut down and about 6% have gone from the UK in the past six years,
according to the BBPA. Some have been closing early or not opening every day
due to energy costs and inflation. Others have been sold off for housing.
James
Watson, pub protection adviser for the Campaign for Pubs, said that it was now
“essential” for many pubs’ survival for them to offer lo-no products. “The
places that are stuck with Kronenbourg and Fosters are dying because the sort
of people who used to frequent them are gone,” he said. “It’s only people with
an income who can still afford to do pub-going as a daily routine rather than a
luxury.”
Publicans
who are adapting say things have generally gone well. Neil Rutherford, who runs
the Flying Handbag in Blackpool, was ordering just one case of San Miguel 0% a
month last year. “Now I’m ordering one a week,” he said.
The Bailey
Head in Oswestry was named pub of the year by the Campaign for Real Ale last
year, but proprietor Grace Goodlad said they had “always made a point of a
having a large non-alcoholic range”.
People are
fascinated by the sober and sober-ish. But the real question is – why aren’t
there more of us?
“We used to
run a range of interesting soft drinks, but since lockdown things have
changed,” she said. Companies like Mash Gang realised that people couldn’t sit
at home drinking six cans of triple IPA every day. “So they and the other craft
heads started to work on a low and no alternative.”
At the Swan
Inn in Lewes, Rebecca Allan serves low-alcohol ciders and Guinness Zero as well
as lagers. Customers often alternate between standard drinks and lo-no – known
as zipping or zebra striping. She puts on events such as wreath-making at
Christmas and the Southover bonfire society meets there regularly.
It provides
some hope that pubs will continue to act as “third spaces” – a place away from
home and work where they are part of a community like the bar in Cheers where
everybody knows your name.
Dr Claire
Markham, senior lecturer in sociology and criminology at Nottingham Trent
University, has researched the impact on communities that lose pubs.
“For people
particularly in rural areas, the decline in the number of pubs was detrimental
for the social and cultural aspect of people’s lives.” Most people recognise
this intuitively, yet still don’t necessarily visit, she said.
“There’s a
narrative that if you’re not going to drink, what’s the point in going to a
pub. I think that’s starting to change. Now they’re offering warm hubs, coffee
shops, book libraries – there’s much more to them.”
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