Pubs, and the demise of.

AFKABartram said:

Radostanradical said:

TelMc32 said:

Radostanradical said:

TelMc32 said:

Radostanradical said:

Happy to educate some of my fellow lifers and followers on the situation with Brewdog.

Its very easy to throw barbs (and with the threshold being pretty low on here some may consider them witty) at the brewery without full context.

They were persured for quite a while by the large international drinks companies for some time for a purchase but tried as hard as they could to stay true to their ethos. What hasnt been reported about is the fact that they were being squeezed out of the putting their goods in regular pubs by those same organisations when they wouldnt sell.

So in laymans terms -

Pub A has a deal with a brewery owned by a massive organisation.

Brewdog asks pub A to stock their drink, pub A refuses or offers incredibly unfair terms for stocking.

Price of brewdog drops as a company.

The major brewerys have a cartel on the market whixh will drive out independents who dont play the game.

That’s a very simplistic view and, if that really was their model to be profitable, a very naive business plan.  The brewers with pub chains stock/sell their own beers/drinks and don’t give up space to promote and make profits for other brewers. Brewdog certainly don’t stock other brewers drinks, but they do have their products in most supermarkets to boost sales. They overextended themselves, sold out to PE and had a co-founder who fell from grace quite spectacularly and dumped on his own “ethos”.

It’s not a simplistic view, it’s literally fact you can research yourself. Admittedly they were somewhat naive but they set out with the best of intentions but thats part of the issue when ypu put yourself on a pedestal, plenty of people will kick you when you make a mistake. It’s worth noting that co-founder had nothing to do woth the decision to sell as he had already been ousted.

Just over half the pubs in the UK (24,500) are owned by pub companies/breweries - including Brewdog themselves remember. That’s who Brewdog were trying to get to sell their beers.  The competition.  You’re essentially asking the Charlton club shop to move some of their stock out and sell Millwall stuff…and then give them the profits for the privilege of doing so  🤦🏻‍♂️🤷🏻‍♂️

There are 21,500 Free Houses, but then you’re essentially trying to do trade deals with individual pubs. 

My family have owned pubs in Ireland and managed them here. Very different models, but if Brewdog were really trying to prop up their business by getting other “tied” pubs to sell their beers for them, it was never going to work. 

As for the co-owner, he was still a 22% shareholder (TSG 23% and the other co-owner Dickie at 21%). TSG pushed for the sale, but needed the co-owners to agree to it as the “punk investors” certainly wouldn’t vote for it.  James Watt did well enough from the original PE deal, sharing £100m with Dickie.  The Covid years and then the revelations about his behaviour and how he treated his staff ended up creating a toxic atmosphere and a broken business. 

 

If you want to win the argument, don’t wave unverified percentages around like facts; cite the dataset, explain the definitions, and then we can have a proper debate.

Mate it’s not an argument, it’s a chat about pubs! Have a read back, you don’t surely talk to people off the internet like that, do you? 

There’s no enemies here, friendly it up a bit! 

clive said:

https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2026/03/06/changes-planned-at-lord-raglan-pub-including-18-room-aparthotel/

se9addick said:

Not sure if this is widely known and will put this on the beer thread too, but Belushi’s in Greenwich do a discount on match days for Charlton fans:

- We get the student discount if you show your Charlton season ticket (it might just be a match day ticket, not sure) which means £5 beer. They have fairly decent generic stuff - Neck Oil, Gamma Ray, Madri, Heineken etc. 

- they have tons of TV’s with the early matches on

- it’s right outside Greenwich station so 5 mins from the Valley by train.

I go in there fairly regular but it seems to normally have more away fans than Addicks and I’m not sure why, so given the paucity of decent pubs for us I thought I’d give it a shout out.  

clive said:

Plans to demolish the Anglesea Arms in Woolwich town centre have been rejected by Greenwich Council.
https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2026/03/12/woolwich-pub-demolition-plan-rejected/

clive said:

se9addick said:

Not sure if this is widely known and will put this on the beer thread too, but Belushi’s in Greenwich do a discount on match days for Charlton fans:

- We get the student discount if you show your Charlton season ticket (it might just be a match day ticket, not sure) which means £5 beer. They have fairly decent generic stuff - Neck Oil, Gamma Ray, Madri, Heineken etc. 

- they have tons of TV’s with the early matches on

- it’s right outside Greenwich station so 5 mins from the Valley by train.

I go in there fairly regular but it seems to normally have more away fans than Addicks and I’m not sure why, so given the paucity of decent pubs for us I thought I’d give it a shout out.  

https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2026/03/28/belushis-bar-in-greenwich-could-become-convenience-store/

CatAddick said:

TelMc32 said:

clive said:

se9addick said:

Not sure if this is widely known and will put this on the beer thread too, but Belushi’s in Greenwich do a discount on match days for Charlton fans:

- We get the student discount if you show your Charlton season ticket (it might just be a match day ticket, not sure) which means £5 beer. They have fairly decent generic stuff - Neck Oil, Gamma Ray, Madri, Heineken etc. 

- they have tons of TV’s with the early matches on

- it’s right outside Greenwich station so 5 mins from the Valley by train.

I go in there fairly regular but it seems to normally have more away fans than Addicks and I’m not sure why, so given the paucity of decent pubs for us I thought I’d give it a shout out.  

https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2026/03/28/belushis-bar-in-greenwich-could-become-convenience-store/

What a load of blocks from the applicant in that planning application who “considers that Belushi’s is a business focussed on food and drink within a bar/restaurant environment rather than a public house.” That way hoping to get round recent application protections put in for pubs.  Also that they cater for tourists and not the local community and that shouldn’t count either. 

Last time I was in there it was full of students - surely they are part of the local community?

Radostanradical said:

CatAddick said:

TelMc32 said:

clive said:

se9addick said:

Not sure if this is widely known and will put this on the beer thread too, but Belushi’s in Greenwich do a discount on match days for Charlton fans:

- We get the student discount if you show your Charlton season ticket (it might just be a match day ticket, not sure) which means £5 beer. They have fairly decent generic stuff - Neck Oil, Gamma Ray, Madri, Heineken etc. 

- they have tons of TV’s with the early matches on

- it’s right outside Greenwich station so 5 mins from the Valley by train.

I go in there fairly regular but it seems to normally have more away fans than Addicks and I’m not sure why, so given the paucity of decent pubs for us I thought I’d give it a shout out.  

https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2026/03/28/belushis-bar-in-greenwich-could-become-convenience-store/

What a load of blocks from the applicant in that planning application who “considers that Belushi’s is a business focussed on food and drink within a bar/restaurant environment rather than a public house.” That way hoping to get round recent application protections put in for pubs.  Also that they cater for tourists and not the local community and that shouldn’t count either. 

Last time I was in there it was full of students - surely they are part of the local community?

I may be wrong but faurly certain it’s near a little square of shops with flats above and I was under the impression those flats were student accomodation?