E2.50 pints should be outlawed, says FG TD

KungPao

I hope Weatherspoon's are a roaring success in Ireland. Sick of paying stupid money for the privilege of a pint of liquid and a sit down.

cena

Should be a fiver a pint.

ricero

KungPao wrote: »

I hope Weatherspoon's are a roaring success in Ireland. Sick of paying stupid money for the privilege of a pint of liquid and a sit down.

They already seem to be. Was in wheterspoons dun laoghaire tonight and there was at least 50-60 people mainly young drinking there and some eating. Not bad for a Monday night in dun laoghaire which is usually a ghost time come the night.

KungPao

ricero wrote: »

They already seem to be. Was in wheterspoons dun laoghaire tonight and there was at least 50-60 people mainly young drinking there and some eating. Not bad for a Monday night in dun laoghaire which is usually a ghost time come the night.

Glad to hear it.

Can't wait til they open up in Dublin CC, hopefully it gives the ripoff merchants something to think about.

KungPao

cena wrote: »

Should be a fiver a pint.

Why?

Highflyer13

mikom wrote: »

You will find this interesting..........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcy8uLjRHPM

That video confused the fcuk out out of me. It was very interesting and made a lot of sense.

Dave147

So if we pay ~ €200 for a keg of Heineken, and manage to get 88 pints out of the keg, which we won't. So the pint is costing us €2.27 to buy, and you expect us to sell it on for €2.50? Are you ****ing mad? We charge €4.20 and cannot possibly sell it any cheaper.

VinLieger

Dave147 wrote: »

So if we pay ~ €200 for a keg of Heineken, and manage to get 88 pints out of the keg, which we won't. So the pint is costing us €2.27 to buy, and you expect us to sell it on for €2.50? Are you ****ing mad? We charge €4.20 and cannot possibly sell it any cheaper.

Wetherspoons manage to do it. They have 900 pubs worth of buying and negotiating power, maybe the Vintner's which make up at least 10 times that number could try and haggle with Diageo and Heineken instead of bowing down to lick their boots every chance they get? Surely that's what the association was set up for in the first place and not the cartel protectionism its being used for nowadays?

osarusan

Dave147 wrote: »

and you expect us to sell it on for €2.50?

I don't expect you to sell it for 2.50 if it costs you 2.27.

But I don't expect some politican to try and hinder a different pub from selling a pint for 2.50 (or less) if they can afford to do so and make a profit.

Beefy78

Wetherspoons can do it not just because of their buying power but because if they can't get Heineken cheap enough then they'll buy something else from someone else. Competition is what drives price down and there's no competition between suppliers in this country.

I'd drink a Heineken, but if it isn't being sold in a pub in the UK then I'll take a Kronenbourg or a Grolsch or Staropramen or whatever else is being sold (not Carling though....). Here every pub is just selling the exact same thing so of course suppliers can charge a high price per keg. I've literally no symapthy.

CramCycle

Should easily get 88 pints out of the keg. I think it used to be approximately 94 or 96 pints and you would pump back in the slops and leftovers to a returns barrel so the brewery would give you credit for this. Diageo stopped that as they rightly see n the stupidity of this system and said, right, most people return this amount, so we are going to charge you for the 94 pints, - the average amount lost (6 pints), - a bit extra so you don't cry foul (4 pints). Then you don't have us wasting money collecting return kegs and weighing them as well as you paying some poor schmuck to hand pump it back in.

Zebra3

You'd swear Heineken was some sort of magical drink.

It's a bland lager that has a huge marketing budget.

Fair play to 'Spoons.

Padraig Mor

VinLieger wrote: »

Wetherspoons manage to do it. They have 900 pubs worth of buying and negotiating power, maybe the Vintner's which make up at least 10 times that number could try and haggle with Diageo and Heineken instead of bowing down to lick their boots every chance they get? Surely that's what the association was set up for in the first place and not the cartel protectionism its being used for nowadays?

Yet Wetherspoon's in Dublin were buying their Heineken etc from Heineken Ireland (not the UK) - so with a grand total of one pub (i.e. feck all buying power), were still able to massively undercut other publicans!

Beano

Padraig Mor wrote: »

Yet Wetherspoon's in Dublin were buying their Heineken etc from Heineken Ireland (not the UK) - so with a grand total of one pub (i.e. feck all buying power), were still able to massively undercut other publicans!

well i'm sure their relationship with heineken in the UK had no bearing on the price they received from heineken ireland.

Dog of Tears

Zebra3 wrote: »

You'd swear Heineken was some sort of magical drink.

7-8 pints will grant you the ability to run through hedges and you will also become an expert in kung fu.

Larbre34

Padraig Mor wrote: »

Yet Wetherspoon's in Dublin were buying their Heineken etc from Heineken Ireland (not the UK) - so with a grand total of one pub (i.e. feck all buying power), were still able to massively undercut other publicans!

2 pubs.

And really its 2 + 1000. Heineken Ireland and Heineken UK are not so unrelated that the lads in Amsterdam wouldnt have a cold sweat at the prospect of a Stg£60 million drop in revenue for the brand as a whole.

JDW are only undercutting the Irish pubs so massively by taking losses. They have to be. Its a model well used by the likes of Ryanair. The UK businesses supplements the Irish operation for a few years until it has perhaps 20 or 30 premises in strategic locations, where it can start to edge up the prices to profitable levels, yet still less than those of sole trading local pub, and so they retain the custom and market share.

In 5 years time you'll be in a JDW paying €4.00 for a pint of lager while up the street the locals will be back to €5.00 to try and keep a slice of the action and with their regulars they will do.

As the saying goes, to make a small fortune, start off with a big one.

The_Captain

Larbre34 wrote: »

2 pubs.

And really its 2 + 1000. Heineken Ireland and Heineken UK are not so unrelated that the lads in Amsterdam wouldnt have a cold sweat at the prospect of a Stg£60 million drop in revenue for the brand as a whole.

JDW are only undercutting the Irish pubs so massively by taking losses. They have to be. Its a model well used by the likes of Ryanair. The UK businesses supplements the Irish operation for a few years until it has perhaps 20 or 30 premises in strategic locations, where it can start to edge up the prices to profitable levels, yet still less than those of sole trading local pub, and so they retain the custom and market share.

In 5 years time you'll be in a JDW paying €4.00 for a pint of lager while up the street the locals will be back to €5.00 to try and keep a slice of the action and with their regulars they will do.

As the saying goes, to make a small fortune, start off with a big one.

They've been in the UK for more than 5 years and they haven't upped their prices to those levels.
Is it so hard to believe that they're willing to take less profit per pint in order to get customers in?

Larbre34

Larbre34 wrote: »

As the saying goes, to make a small fortune, start off with a big one.

Yeah, that's how JDW came to be publicly traded in London.

CramCycle

Larbre34 wrote: »

2 pubs.

And really its 2 + 1000. Heineken Ireland and Heineken UK are not so unrelated that the lads in Amsterdam wouldnt have a cold sweat at the prospect of a Stg£60 million drop in revenue for the brand as a whole.

Agreed, not sure how anyone thought any different

JDW are only undercutting the Irish pubs so massively by taking losses. They have to be. Its a model well used by the likes of Ryanair. The UK businesses supplements the Irish operation for a few years until it has perhaps 20 or 30 premises in strategic locations, where it can start to edge up the prices to profitable levels, yet still less than those of sole trading local pub, and so they retain the custom and market share.

They really are not, the pub trade is loosing ground every day with a few exceptions, has been for a few years, helped by the recession but long before that many of my friends had taken to only strolling in for last orders and having a few sociable drinks at home.

They maybe making a tenth of the gross profit per pint, but with the numbers I hear from friends going to Blackrock and Dun Laoghaire, they are more than doing 10 times the footfall of neighbouring pubs every week.

VinLieger

CramCycle wrote: »

Agreed, not sure how anyone thought any different

They really are not, the pub trade is loosing ground every day with a few exceptions, has been for a few years, helped by the recession but long before that many of my friends had taken to only strolling in for last orders and having a few sociable drinks at home.

They maybe making a tenth of the gross profit per pint, but with the numbers I hear from friends going to Blackrock and Dun Laoghaire, they are more than doing 10 times the footfall of neighbouring pubs every week.

This is exactly whats happening in both locations, and rather than take the hint and try to innovate and come up with a better business model the vintner's are determined to continue to try and rip people off even thought it is proven to be a failing way to do business

jackofalltrades

Dave147 wrote: »

So if we pay ~ €200 for a keg of Heineken, and manage to get 88 pints out of the keg, which we won't. So the pint is costing us €2.27 to buy, and you expect us to sell it on for €2.50? Are you ****ing mad? We charge €4.20 and cannot possibly sell it any cheaper.

Putting aside Irish pub drinkers rabid brand loyalty, what would be the cheapest price that you could pick up something similar to Heineken at?

Larbre34 wrote: »

JDW are only undercutting the Irish pubs so massively by taking losses. They have to be.

A lot of people make this claim, but no one has yet to provide proof that they are selling their drinks for less than they are buying them at.

CramCycle

jackofalltrades wrote: »

A lot of people make this claim, but no one has yet to provide proof that they are selling their drinks for less than they are buying them at.

Mainly because they are not, to do this with an already large investment in the purchase of the profit would be lunacy. They are a large chain but they could not do this for long as far as the bean counters are concerned, as the market would not be stable enough if they planned to jump the prices.

It only looks like below cost because of the price in other pubs but I have seen pubs in Dublin selling 3 euro pints for years to get punters in the door, but the thing they lacked that Wetherspoons has was a fresh clientele. I wouldn't frequent some of the cheaper pubs because the crowd were not the type I want to have a pint in the company of.

To give a better example of other mark ups, my favourite example was soft drinks, Cola etc. Being sold for 2.50 a bottle. It was bought in for about 50cent a bottle but then you also reduced this to 27cent a bottle when you factored in the return of empties, so a gross profit per 250ml bottle of coke of 2.23euro, factoring in wages, fridges, breakages etc, they were still well clear of 1.50 a bottle profit on a quiet night. Often drinks companies would provide designated driver cases as part of a marketing campaign, so the bar would get in a couple of crates of Pepsi/Coke, and in a group of 4 or 5, if one was not drinking, that driver would get his minerals for free as the driver. Great idea only I never walked into a pub where the promo signs had not been taken down as soon as the rep was out the door, i.e. 2.50euro gross profit per bottle.

keeponhurling

jackofalltrades wrote: »

Putting aside Irish pub drinkers rabid brand loyalty, what would be the cheapest price that you could pick up something similar to Heineken at?


A lot of people make this claim, but no one has yet to provide proof that they are selling their drinks for less than they are buying them at.

The Wetherspoons guy stated the other day on the radio that they are not loss making.
Why would they enter the Irish market otherwise?
It would be an expensive way to simply troll the VFI

Seems they are just better able to negotiate with brewers. they have the flexibility that if they don;t get a deal they like, they will simply buy their beer elsewhere.

e.g. for many pubs it would be unthinkable to not sell Guinness, but Wetherspoons have shown it's not the end of the world.
Beamish does just fine for most stout drinkers

Akrasia

Here's a link to their menu in Three Tun Tavern FYI in case it's not been posted before
http://www.jdwetherspoon.ie/pdf/ThreeTunTavernDec14.pdf

drink and food prices are very competitive

Padraig Mor

Larbre34 wrote: »

2 pubs.

One pub before Heineken Ireland threw a hissy fit; one pub which significantly undercut the competition.

And really its 2 + 1000. Heineken Ireland and Heineken UK are not so unrelated that the lads in Amsterdam wouldnt have a cold sweat at the prospect of a Stg£60 million drop in revenue for the brand as a whole.

There is obviously some degree of separation between Heineken UK and Ireland, otherwise things would not have ended up as they did. Heineken UK's press release after Wetherspoons pulled the plug clearly suggested that they were majorly pissed off at the Irish branch, i.e. the Irish branch acted independently in telling Wetherspoons to get stuffed. There is no reason not to believe that they priced in an independent fashion as well, i.e. that the Wetherspoons Blackrock pub got the same price as similarly sized single pubs.

JDW are only undercutting the Irish pubs so massively by taking losses. .

Wetherspoons have stated that they make a profit on everything they sell.

zl1whqvjs75cdy

Last year JDW reported a before tax profit of £78.4 million, which was a 37% increase on the previous year. The TD claims that weatherspoons is a poor business, I think she needs to go back to economics 101. I appreciate that these figures don't take the Irish operation into account (their trading year ends in July) but it will be interesting to see how the company preforms this year. Bottom line is they wouldn't have opened here if they didn't see a profit in it so all those saying it can't be making money must know something that JDW doesn't.

Financial report here for those interested; http://www.jdwetherspoon.co.uk/home/investors/finance-reports/annual-report--revised-final--05.01.15.pdf

keeponhurling

HIB wrote: »

I don't really see the supermarkets as a problem, but I think wetherspoons could be a problem for the Ireland tourism 'brand'.

You're right that they are competing in the same space as independently run pubs, and with their large buying power, they are sure to win a lot of these battles. So, we will end up with less independently run pubs and more wetherspoons or chain pubs.

I'd worry that 'chain pubs' aren't very attractive to tourists, in the same way that chain restaurants aren't very attractive. I suppose the cities could safely handle a few wetherspoons, but my fear would be that they will grow and grow, swallowing up the competition until independent pubs are in the minority.

From a purely selfish point of view though, I'm looking forward to the cheap pints!

Well, when McDonalds' introduced cheaper food it didn't spell the end of restaurants as we know it, just offered another cheaper option.

Similarly with Aldi/Lidl. We still have convenience stores, and Tesco / Dunnes still operate.

People will always pay a little extra for convenience, quality, or just whatever their own personal taste is. (those who can afford it)

For example this Fine Gael TD, it wouldn't matter if Wetherspoons were selling pints for 10c on every street, I suspect she'd still be getting her drinks in the Shelbourne and the Dáil bar.

The_Captain

If the feet in the door are anything to go by, Dubs are happier with €2.50 pints of generic beer than €5.40 Heineken

Caliden

It is a bit disappointing that a chain may force some pubs to close but at the same time it's a kick up the arse to the VFI and Diageo that they will lose business if they don't see the err of their ways and change how they're doing things.

Sasso

Agree with previous posts, Deputy MMO'C couldn't string a few sentences together on Matt Cooper show. Ridiculous. I wonder was she still under influence of the the glass of champagne (did she pay €3 for it ? ) that she was drinking on the cover of Sunday Independent Life magazine celebrating the end of recession, alongside other muppets. Extremely poor judgement call on her part. It shows that even recently elected FG first timers are now totally out of touch with real world.