Market Research

[davidb]

Right folks in need of a little bit of help here
Just been made assistant manager at my local pub and basicly we need to get more cash in the tills and punters through the door,regulary.

My question is what type of events would attract you to go to a certain pub,
i.e Live bands, quizes etc

or any sort of ideas that prehaps you would like to see at your local pub ?

Any constructive feedback good or bad greatfuly received
Thanks

[KoeN]

cheap white beers.

[A2]

Need some information about what sort of pub it is first.

Cool and modern or cosy and traditional.
Big or small
What sort of area are you in? Predominantly students/working class/middle class/pensioners
Drinks promotions, or "standard" pub prices where you are.
Selection of drinks? Normal sort of pub selection, or something a little different - current specialities?
Who are you trying to attract?

[davidb]

well yeah that aswel think we all would go for that,
also what type of drinks would you normaly have if you were in a pub, bottle beer,alcopops,wine,shorts,beers etc

[davidb]

Originally Posted by A2

Need some information about what sort of pub it is first.

Cool and modern or cosy and traditional.
Big or small
What sort of area are you in? Predominantly students/working class/middle class/pensioners
Drinks promotions, or "standard" pub prices where you are.
Selection of drinks? Normal sort of pub selection, or something a little different - current specialities?
Who are you trying to attract?

Bit modern,young management but with a traditional feel.

smallish pub only can hold about 200 odd people if there is say a live band on

Working/middle class people

Normal selection of drinks with alcopops and things like that, as for on the pumps again normal realy, fosters carlsberg etc

The town the pub is in does have a lot of young people drinking, i.e 18-30 so we would be more appealing to that type of crowd,there isnt a uni in the town or realy near by so prices of drinks etc arent realy low id say they were about avarge

)

[Dante Hicks]

1. Cheap drinks.

2. Lax ID policy.

3. Non-fascist door-men.

4. Don't play overly loud music, ffs. If you're going to play music, at a reasonable level so I can actually speak to people I'm with. Don't try and be a night club.

5. Some kind of drink offers (E.g. x shots for £x) for when I want to binge drink with friends.

6. Not overly pretentious.

7. Perhaps some kind of cheap-food deal if this is the first pub of the evening.

That's about it. I'm not a massive pubber though, by any means. Also don't see that many live bands in pubs, although when I do it's a slightly different type of evening.

[JC]

Have a quiz on atleast once a week. Might sound like a bit of an old persons thing, but me and my mates go along to our local every Sunday/Monday to the pub quizes and have a laugh. Tends to bring in at least an extra 60-70 people to the pub that wouldnt be there on a normal night, so well worth it.

Its got to be a pretty good quiz though otherwise it just becomes a mess and not worth turning up for, oh and preferably free. The one i go to employs an external person to come in and run it, with his DJ set etc for a music round.

Live football always brings people in on week nights for Champs League or mid-day Saturday for Premiership matches etc.

[davidb]

4) deffinatly agree with you on this one i hate it when i cant even talk to my friends when we are in a pub and we have to shout

1) 5) i agree on this one i would say our prices are about right but unfortunatly its the brewry that decide on our prices not the management.

7) yup good idea with the food somthing simple before you start your night off is good for you suppose just sumthing like a burger or chips etc


p.s Would you be intrested in having food at a pub before you hit the town on a night out
if yes what sort of food/snacks would you be intrested in ?

[davidb]

Originally Posted by JC

Have a quiz on atleast once a week. Might sound like a bit of an old persons thing, but me and my mates go along to our local every Sunday/Monday to the pub quizes and have a laugh. Tends to bring in at least an extra 60-70 people to the pub that wouldnt be there on a normal night, so well worth it.

Its got to be a pretty good quiz though otherwise it just becomes a mess and not worth turning up for, oh and preferably free. The one i go to employs an external person to come in and run it, with his DJ set etc for a music round.

Live football always brings people in on week nights for Champs League or mid-day Saturday for Premiership matches etc.

Yeah we have the full package from sky which does give us a bit of edge over some pubs as we have also got the premiership + channel which not a lot of pubs around tamworth do have.

We use to do quize nights on a sunday night,it went ok it was free to enter and the winning team also got 8 free pints out of it so there was an incentive to win aswel

i agree with the french maids bit but i dont look too good in a outfit like that,sorry


If you are into your indy-rock/band type would you go to a pub if you knew a live band were playing?

[Tomkat]

I think you should steer clear of the live bands thing.

Go for drink offers. 2 alcopops for £3, that kind of stuff.

Happy Hour as well.

Do you have Snooker or Darts there? Some kind of tournament could be set up.

What you need is a slight edge that makes people go "Where should we go tonight? Let's go there, because xxxxxx". Cheap drinks is the usual incentive.

[Dante Hicks]

Fit barmaids is the other.

[davidb]

ok fit bar maid or french barmaids got it dante,thanks

We do have a pool table and we also have a fuzzball table so prehaps a championship or sumthing like that could be set up, good idea

we do have pool,football,paintball teams aswel which do bring in a few more people after there games.

i know cheap drink/fit bar maids is the main incentive for any people to go for a certain pub on say a certain night or all the time but would there be anything else?

Thanks for this guys lots of good feedback cheers carry on !

[A2]

Doesn't sound like the sort of pub where a band would fit in quite.
Pub Quizes (esp free ones) are always good. Give away something like £10 drinks voucher for the winners, £5 for the runners up and 4 bags of crisps for the losers. (That's what my local at home does anyway)

Surely although you have to buy the beer from a specific brewery at their prices there's still flexibility at your end to do promo's or is it actually owned by the chain, rather than by the landlord?

Food before going out - nothing too poncy.
Burgers, chips, jacket potatoes, some vegetarian equivalent, a cold option, maybe some sort of pasta (bolognaise or lasagne or something) all priced reasonably cheaply and served until 19:30 or something.

You got a pool table or anything?
If so, is the pub generally busy during the day, or could you do something like offer free pool from opening until 5pm during the week to attract people in?

[Catwoman]

how about an internet cafe pub, we could combine pa and beer, with topless barmen would be better but if not just pa is fine

[davidb]

yeah does have a pool table again tis priced about right its £1 a game but some other pubs do 50p a game,not that many in my town that do have pool tables so i would think to make the most of it we would need to lower the prices a bit prehaps.

Free pool during the day could work but there isnt normaly many people in during the day to say make the most of it, but still this is something we are trying to change

agree with the food option like you said something simple i know i wouldnt want a 4 course meal before i hit the town.

the pub is owned by the chain unfortunatly i think we might be able to get them to lower the prices a bit but i think that would only be for say spesific events,

As for Happy hours this is something ive been on a campaign for in my pub before i was even working there,
now im assistant manager this is somthing that i will have the power to change hopefully

Live band actualy fit in quit well we get a lot of people in when we advertise this, normaly though we have it on a sat night which is a busy time anyway so im thinking about trying to get it moved to say a sunday or thursday night instead


Keep it up more views welcome !

[davidb]

Originally Posted by Catwoman

how about an internet cafe pub, we could combine pa and beer, with topless barmen would be better but if not just pa is fine

You might have a point with this one, prehaps a computer or something like that could work,dunno how much money it would all cost though to set somthing like that,

p.s forgot to mention the pub also has a jukebox which does get a lot of people's nights going if the right songs come on prehaps if we already have a jukebox exstend it abit and have say a constant microphone there so we can turn it into a kareokee (sp) ??

[MrL_JaKiri]

The computer is a bad idea. It's too easily damaged, in a multitude of ways.

[MrL_JaKiri]

Have a barbershop quartet.

Or the viennese philharmonic.

[Dead_Meat]

Originally Posted by MrL_JaKiri

The computer is a bad idea. It's too easily damaged, in a multitude of ways.

But if you had Jonny living in your town, you'd have it in use 24/7 and money flowing over the bar for the same time...

[davidb]

cheers for the info guys its gave me some ideas and that to what we can do or as some cases may be not do,

any more thoughts on what you would like to see happen in your pub let me know

[Ragnarak]

Some type of quiz machine?

Also, if you offer free drinks to GD me and Stew will drop by at some stage as Tamworths near home

[davidb]

Yeah got a quiz machine gets a fair bit of use is normaly good for the girls when the lads are playing pool,

were bouts do you 2 live then,come visit me

[Nodrog]

strict exclusive door policy (not dresscode related, just a general no riffraff/townies/shit students/whatever thing), cheap drinks.

Try and have a bit of class regarding your clientele, and youll be in the top 2% of pubs almost automatically (although you probably wont have many customers)

[pablissimo]

Originally Posted by Nodrog

Try and have a bit of class regarding your clientele, and youll be in the top 2% of pubs almost automatically (although you probably wont have many customers)

Great plan.

Originally Posted by davidb

and basicly we need to get more cash in the tills and punters through the door,regulary.

Live music once a week on one of the quieter nights should get more punters in, nothing rocky, maybe an unplugged open-mic night or at least an acoustic house-band. And a projection screen for the Euro 2004 matches.

[Rumad]

Your orginal question depends on your clientel.

My gf's mom and dad go to a pub which has live music mainly oldies, but its packed all night and the sales must be superb.

Younger pepleprefer more moder surroundings and disco type music, hough tribute bands can do wel with this type of crowd.

Its always horses fr courses - I like somewhere that serves decent food, a decent pint and is a relaxing night out. I am 30 now though s getting past it

[midge5]

Originally Posted by davidb

My question is what type of events would attract you to go to a certain pub,
i.e Live bands, quizes etc

A few pubs in my area make a killing off live bands. They have converted an upstairs room so that it can hold a stage then put a place for serving drinks in the corner. Once a night then, normally Friday they will have a local band there who are not too old, 17-20say. These will then bring all their mates and as long as you are lax on ID it will go around all the schools quickly and you will be packed every week.

[Stew]

Originally Posted by Ragnarak

Some type of quiz machine?

Also, if you offer free drinks to GD me and Stew will drop by at some stage as Tamworths near home

Seconded!!!

Rag - I thought you said a while ago you dont drink? I'll have your free drinks and you can drive my car home

[Snurx]

If you go for live bands, try to attract from scenes that are big, but not bands that are big, like if you have a punk evening, try to find one or two big DIY bands,(Those play almost for free at cool places, and at not-so-cool places they take very little money.), and find bands from around you to attract friends of them and so on. I would not have much live music, maybe once or twice in a month, or at least try different genres. The genres depends on your clientel, of course. And remeber, political DIY bands are cheaper while still giving a positve message! (Stay clear of nazi'es of course, not just beacause they're filthy swine, but the local antifascists might just smash your windows or something)

A TV is a good thing, but don't just use it for footy. I love sitting with a beer when I'm watching Simpsons. There was a pub around the corner from where I usually hang that had a TV, and it was filled up everytime Simpsons was on. They made a lot of cash, and now that their TV is gone, nobody goes there anymore.

Pool tables are a nice thing, but try to have them cheap/free. Other things like Dart and stuff is a cool thing too, it gives people something to do on the "boring" nights. As does a quiz.

[Nodrog]

what about airhockey? I've never been in a pub with an airhockey table.

[Ste]

Any of the following make me go to a pub:

Cheap (and nice) Drinks - decent hand-pulled beer is attractive. A nice cocktail list might make you stand out from the other pubs too.

Cheap and available pool - my local has pool for 50p a game during the week and £1 a game evenings and weekends. Also a killer pool tournament every friday. Darts is also fun sometimes

Nice range of decent food - food offers are good for lunchtimes, 2 meals for £7 etc.

Sport on TV - advertise this quite a bit and get a portuguese (or whatever) channel for next season and you can show premiership games at 3 on a saturday. drinks offers during the footy will bring in punters.

Comfy seats and plenty of space - especially if you just want a quiet pint or two.

Not too loud music and variation - you want to be able to chat to people and noone wants to see (or hear) tarted up old women dancing in a pub to the music they just put on the juke box.

A decent pub quiz - a decent prize is good, free drinks or cash etc. stick the questions on the big screen and noone even has to call them out so it doesn't disrupt anyone elses night. My local does 4 a week - General Knowledge, Sport, Music and TV.

Friendly staff - noone likes rude bouncers or barmen/women and pedantic management piss me off too. Fit barmades are a must


Hope they help so where's the pub? I want to go there after these suggestions are implemented

[Stew]

Originally Posted by Ste

get a portuguese (or whatever) channel for next season and you can show premiership games at 3 on a saturday.

Great plan, except its illegal in this country!
I kno some pubs still do this (the Hadfield used to but stopped this season) so maybe the costs are outweighed by the gains but I doubt it.

Best Saturday afternoon was in Tenerife - sun outside, pint of Bitter in hand, loads of teles - some with one match (from Greek TV), one with another (from Arabic) and the other with Gillette Soccer Saturday! Ahh bliss!

[Ste]

Yeh - I live opposite the Hadfield, didn't realise they'd stopped the live saturday afternoon footy... ah well.

[Stew]

Originally Posted by Ste

Yeh - I live opposite the Hadfield, didn't realise they'd stopped the live saturday afternoon footy... ah well.

Was this the local you were on about?

[davidb]

cheers guys/gals im gonna be taking some of these ideas to the brewery hopefully soon.

person who said about the air hockey table,not a bad idea at all that we have a fusseball table but i do like the sounds of air hockey !

[Stew]

Wot about givin me and Rag free drinks?! We like that plan best!

[Marilyn Manson]

Free beer.

[Evergreen]

How many pubs in your area?

Start a Pool League or a Darts League with other pubs where the matches are played on quieter nights.

That will pull your blue collar money earning punters in who need that wee bit of competition to assert themselves in their world.