Tim Martin: bringing cask ale into disrepute. How low can he go?
Wetherspoons Tim Martin has announced a reduction in prices in his pubs and got a lot of publicity in the process.
The price reductions are across food and drink but are focused on cask beer with a pint of Ruddles selling for £1.29 in most Spoons.
There is complexity and argument here but we may as well deal with the headline impact first. This will be seen as good news by many who like a pint but are even more cash strapped now than they were in March. No amount of fulminating on social media or apps like Neverspoons (which manages to promote some pubs that are worse than Spoons- they do exist) will stop them going in. Staring reality in the face is important.
Understanding what the reality means is another matter.
Martin is taking advantage of the Chancellor’s temporary reduction of VAT to 5% in hospitality (but not alcohol) to cut his prices on food and beer. The promo posters praise Mr Sunak for moving towards VAT equality between pubs and supermarkets (on food- its zero rated in supermarkets). Perhaps the wider takeaway from this is that Martin a well known Johnson supporter may be switching to Sunak, as may the Tory Party itself before long.
Still back to the beer. Martin really is flaunting it here for a Tory. Not only is he taking advantage of a Government hand out to boost his profits (but *obviously* not the wages of workers) he also took a £48m Business Recovery loan to help things along.
The publicity features the logos of SIBA and CAMRA. As might be expected on social media one finds some who in my day would have been regarded as inhabitants of the saloon bar managing to blame the whole thing on CAMRA. I wont be checking but I wouldn’t be sure they were as quick to praise CAMRA for its Black Lives Matters statement one of far too few in pubs and brewing I might add.
Anyway SIBA and CAMRA have disassociated themselves and in a joint statement underlined that reducing the price of cask in Spoons when many independents just wont be in a position to do that damages the whole pub trade and in the end hits the drinker too.
I noticed one tweet asking why CAMRA ever got involved with Spoons in the first place. The answer is that for decades Spoons pubs were often one of the few and sometimes the only pub in a location where a drinkable pint of cask ale was to be found. Times change and while I’m not boycotting Spoons (which isn’t an action backed by unionised Spoons workers) I now regard Martin’s association with cask ale as tending to bring it into disrepute.
This needs to be recognised and addressed.
I haven’t been able to rsearch this, so it’s not verified, however my husband, a longtime cask ale drinker and former CAMRA person has told me that Tory Tim’s business model is to acquire his product at discount because it’s almost at the use-by date. This might be why some of the more respected brands have swerved him. The truth is that Spoons is a Day Drinker pub full of people with alcohol problems and just not the sort of environment where most discerning hobby quaffers would enjoy.
I think I would be cautious about accepting stereotypes of Martin’s pubs rather than the man himself who seems to have become a caricature. The use by date thing is a myth and cask is often sold when its not yet ready (not fully conditioned) in Spoons due to the fast turnover they have. That is due to price & that is achieved by getting breweries to sell to them at very low margin because of the amount they take. Low prices do of course attract some all day drinkers who seek company & warmth but its worth keeping in mind that of pub chains Spoons probably sell the most drinkable coffee & do on a one off payment for an ever re-fillable cup.