Heineken to spruce up its pubs
It’s a start. The UK’s number one brewer Heineken has unveiled plans to pump more than GBP 13 million (EUR 15 million/USD 20 million) into refurbishing some of its bars. The brewer’s Star Pubs & Bars unit, formerly the Scottish & Newcastle Pub Company, has spent GBP 700,000 over the past three months in Scotland alone and has a further GBP 603,000 earmarked for refits in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Inverness in the coming weeks, Scottish media reported in early August 2013.
As pub-going is declining, pub companies have realised that they need to do something to get people back into pubs. Free WIFI and Sky Sports in the corner are probably not enough to convince punters to visit pubs and splash out on expensive beers.
Heineken has spent GBP 600 million (EUR 697 million) on buying and doing up pubs since 2010 to take its estate up to 1,340 outlets. In 2011 Heineken bought more than 900 pubs from the taxpayer-backed Royal Bank of Scotland in a GBP 412 million deal alone. It also bought sites from the Globe Pub Company.
Landlords, who lease sites from Heineken, also pump some of their own cash into the refurbishments. The “refurbishment” of bars usually involves offering more food and a “premiumisation” of drinks, it was reported.
News of Heineken’s investment comes after the Irish drinks group C&C, the producer of Magner’s cider and Tennent’s beer, last year lent GBP 11.5 million to 150 landlords in Scotland to refurbish their pubs.
