Man your pumps, Wetherspoons are coming

I wouldn't mind it if we could avail of the higher strength beers that you can get in an English pub, like Kronenberg and Stella Artois. Even Heineken is a higher strength in the UK. Lagers served in Irish pubs are nothing more than gassy slop, by comparison.

I could never understand why any other half decent publican hasn't used the JDW business model before now. When times were good everyone was obviously looking to make as much cash as possible with sky high prices but since the downturn with people avoiding pubs like the plague a decent pub with good food and drink prices would have cleaned up. Especially in Dublin.

jack presley wrote: »

I'm surprised the soft drinks machines they use in Weatherspoons and places like McDonalds hasn't caught on in pubs. I know they make a killing on charging extortionate prices for bottles but the syrup for the machines costs next to nothing so in sure if they charged around a euro a glass they'd still make a killing and the punters would live the cheaper price

It really depends on the place. I've paid similar or higher prices than bottles in Dublin for coke/pepsi from a gun in London/Bologna.

It doesn't seem to matter how much it costs, it's how much they can get away with charging.

dd972 wrote: »

Those 'beers' you refer to are the same Brewed under Licence pish as Irish Heineken, try the Stella in Belgium or the Kronenbourg in France and taste and feel the difference.

I'd settle for the English-based brew. It's a lot better than what's served in Ireland.

would they carry a lash of real-ale like they do in UK? or just cheap lagers

jack presley wrote: »

I'm surprised the soft drinks machines they use in Weatherspoons and places like McDonalds hasn't caught on in pubs. I know they make a killing on charging extortionate prices for bottles but the syrup for the machines costs next to nothing so in sure if they charged around a euro a glass they'd still make a killing and the punters would live the cheaper price

Got a quick tour of a pub in England about 10-12 years ago, including the cellar. Good chat with the manager about real ale and the like, which I didn't know much about at the time. He told me that the 10-litre boxes of syrup weren't very expensive, plus you can make hundreds of litres from one box. Just hook it up and make a killing.

However, the margin on real ale was tiny (can't remember how much, but the pints were going for 1.40), considering there was more cellarmanship required (turning the cask, letting out the excess gas build-up and the like).

Not really about JDW per se , but I see a few postings about soft drink pumps etc

My brother ran a pub for Fullers for a number of years ( oh I had some happy days drinking Pride directly out of the barrel in the Cellar ! )

a) He made little or no money on the real ale because of the gunk in the barrel which he was charged for ! For that reason you made sure you looked after the barrel and DIDN'T KNOCK/Move IT !!! He had special shelves that tilted gently on springs as the barrel emptied . One tapped , one resting for 48hrs before it was tapped ( IIRC which I may not )
b) He reckoned he made a little on the lagers etc , but had to make sure there was a decent head on the pints ! ( he said that was the only way to make a profit )
c) he made a serious margin on the soft drinks. He loved people to drink pints of coke !

But most of his money was made on the grub.

interestingly , he washed his lines for real ale every morning , reckoned if he didn't it went off pretty quickly........

He took pride in his ale , he reckoned this actually brought people to his pub , he is still fussy about his beer and when in England I love going for a pint with him because he knows where to go for a decent pint.

Just as a side line , making money in the pub trade when he was in it was hard ..... if he made his targets he got rewarded by harder targets !

All JDW pubs are by definition managed , which is the one thing about Irish pubs which often have proper owner/managers . This means it's hard for the manager to stamp their own personality on the pub , for example the menus are laminated and the food is centrally purchased etc .

rubadub wrote: »

A stink of piss, no toilet seat or jacks roll, a rickety table attempted to be leveled with a beermat, no 2 glasses or chairs the same in the place, obnoxious surly old bollocks of a barman, faded old guinness memorobilia dotted around the smoke stained walls & shelves, and a €1 Oirish Muzak cd from the powercity bargain bin grating your ears...

You're obviously working for Bord Failte. :pac:

Holsten wrote: »

I'd welcome them with open arms, love them! And I'm not even a big drinker!

Even if it's Holsten!?!

Spoons is what it is cheap place to drink you make your own fun with the people you with.

The pubs will now have to stop ripping ppl off if weather spoons gets it foot in the door and open one up every where

In the uk there is one in nearly every big town you go to

They can play music in them if they open under the name Lloyds number 1 bar
The ones in Glasgow are nice to go to

The Mcdonalisation of pubs. It's okay on occasion for grub and cheap pints of lager but they have no character or ambiance, also they encourage binge drinking with Ibiza style offers of pitchers of WKD Vodka combined with other bilge. I preferred visiting local pubs with character in U.K. and trying craft beers. I hope it doesn't work out, but Starbucks has taken hold here so I won't hold my breath.

Deleted User wrote: »

Bit different to starbucks. And it'll take a lot of pitches of WKD to get a group drunk. Unless they think otherwise to begin with

Here are the pitchers: http://www.jdwetherspoon.co.uk/home/drink/cocktails-9 I think it's similar to Starbucks as it's killing local business, presenting people with carbon cut outs of corporate blandness on their street corners, supplying a mediocre product en masse. I've only visited Blackrock a few times but they have some lovely pubs with interesting histories, decent pints and live music would hate to see them close because of J.D. Wetherspoons.

drumswan wrote: »

What is this 'character, ambiance, atmosphere' that is in non-Wetherspoons pubs? How are they quantified? Surely those are characters of the people in the pubs, the location etc.

The large majority of Irish pubs are dumps with rubbish macro beer on draught and with staff that know nothing about their product.

Places that have a local history, or have fireplaces, memorabilia on the walls, interesting furnishings, something born our of individual taste rather than carbon cut out functional decor. If that makes me a snob then I'm a snob