What has the trade come to ?

[Eddie86]

Agree there are some awful pubs around, and as they close they wail about cheap booze from supermarkets, tax etc, never look at themselves

Two local to me closed near end of 2008, both were taken over early 2009 and are now thriving, in one I asked landlady how things were going, her takings have increased 1000%, just by being friendly, and more importantly being open, previous one never seemed to be open when expected, plus of course keeping out undesirables & trouble

I think one publican poster on here [Eddie?] had right idea, after a bad review contacted poster, apologised and tried to make amends, what a change from either ignoring complaints or threaten legal action

I still go over and have a look at my favourite review from over there - the guy going on about black sheep.

I believe in chatting to customers to find out what they want - after all its them who keep food on my table! And if there is something wrong with the pub I want to know about it PDQ so I can make amends.

What I've started doing is writing to pubs that I've found really bad - just telling them of my experience, not judgemental or telling them what should have happened. It's when the landlord sends a letter back saying 'your wrong' that I get angry!

For the record, I won't be around much these two weeks - we're shutting the pub for improvements and it's likely to be 18hr days minimum (as an example tonight after closing I'm with Dad taking apart the bar and bench seating and floor, which will go on to the early hours...)

[Conrad]

You'll be missed for the fortnight Ed, hope the work goes well, and I would love to see some before and after pictures.

[arwkrite]

tonight after closing I'm with Dad taking apart the bar and bench seating and floor, which will go on to the early hours...)

Eddie you should have arranged a Wales v England darts match on NYE. I reckon the customers would have taken the bar and fixtures apart at some stage of evening and saved you and your dad the trouble. Might have got some compensation payment as well to defray the cost of the refurb.

[runningdog]

!
I'm with Dad taking apart the bar and bench seating and floor, which will go on to the early hours...)

Best of luck, Eddie. My 'spiritual' local took itself to pieces a few months ago. When the landlord and a couple of customers tried to undo what they'd done they found everything fitted as it should, if they left the wiring out..........

[Eddie86]

Right then. Just got back, and here's a couple of pics for you. I only had my phone with me, so there not the greatest:

Before (the wall with the fireplace and mirror is the bit thats being knocked down, but notice the floor at the minute)



And at 3am this morning it looked a bit like this:



That is genuine Edwardian floorboards, solid oak, that we're going to take up, clean, and put down again. For the area of the bar which will have this, about 20m2 I think, only 1 floorboard needs replacing, which we're over the moon about. The quality of the stuff is unbelievable. I'll take proper pictures tomorrow.

Night Night

[arwkrite]

Thank you for the pics Eddie. Lovely fireplace.So many of them were ripped out in the 50's and 60's in the name of modernisation.Places were built to higher standards and meant to last longer than the 20 year guarantee you get now.

[Conrad]

Hi Ed,

Nice to see a proper pub interior, none of these bright spotlights and bolted down plastic seats. Your neighbours must love you though knocking down walls and lifting carpet till 3 in the morning .

Just had a laugh at your tweets as well - £2 pint, how could you do that without warning Hoppy?

[Eddie86]

No neighbours to speak of really - the next door neighbour is the other side of the kitchen, which is other side of lower bar.

I'm going to be taking pictures each day - I'm just taking 15mins before getting back to it, so I may start a new thread once I work out how to make the pictures smaller.

That fireplace is listed, and is now in the back room. As for £2 a pint, that cleared us out of scrumpy, Butty, Carling that evening. Still got Old Henry 'on' in the cellar, straight from the barrel

[Tilly-Miss]

Good luck with the revamp, i hope everything goes as smooth as the pint you pull.

[Conrad]

I'm going to be taking pictures each day - I'm just taking 15mins before getting back to it, so I may start a new thread once I work out how to make the pictures smaller.

Sounds good, I look forward to seeing them. If you are stuck on the images, I haven't used it for a while, but I seem to remember Picasa was good for that sort of thing.