Packing away the pieces

In amongst the facts and figures of the "tour statistics" post I mentioned that the tour ran for a total of 367 days (or 1 year and 1 day if that makes it easier) and it's possibly worth revisiting why for the last 12 and a tiny fraction of the 13th months (see there's always another way of presenting statistics) I and the other tourists have been ploughing around doing this.

Obviously there are the reasons of gaining the Cask Marque prizes and the inbuilt nature of the male which seems to need to satisfy the obsessive nature of being able to collect something but I'd like to think there was another reason, that of believing in something that as a country we're blindly starting to lose and something we'll probably not really realise what we might be risking until it has gone. And that of course is the great British Pub.

I'm not going to get drawn into the minutia of figures and statistics again (see the last post if you want those!) but the pressures and hardships that are being faced by our pubs might never have been so great and I think even the most seldom of pub visitor cannot be unaware of the frightening rate of closure of both town and rural pubs.

Writers who managed to make a living from scribbling summed up the wonders and joys of the British pub much better than I ever can, so I’ll keep my eulogy brief and just say that the unique institution is surely something far too precious to thrown onto the scrap heap?

So to sum this sentiment up, if there's anything I hope I've achieved by running the tour is that the tourists themselves have also rediscovered and enjoyed a visit to the pub and possibly away from these rather silly nights out they'll continue to support their locals.

Back to the nature of the tour again though, it was the Cask Marque tour and we should focus a little bit on what being a Cask Marque pub means. Obviously Cask Marque are in the business of promoting good quality cask ale and as such with their close scrutiny of the standard of ale being served in their accredited pubs it's a very handy way to ensure that when in a unfamiliar area of town, you're pretty much assured a fairly decent pint. And if your pint isn't decent, well at least you have another course of recourse by virtue of the fact you can raise the issue with Cask Marque themselves, who'll deal with the pub themselves. 

I know only a little of the hoops that must be jumped through to gain Cask Marque accreditation but I know they're not simple, so there was one thing that had me scratching my head harder and harder as the tour went along. Why go to all the hard work of attaining the certificate and then not bother to display the certificate? I totally understand that some places might not have had them up on the wall for perfectly legitimate reasons (change of landlord for example) but far too many place seemed either completely indifferent to it ("oh I think it's in the office somewhere but I don't know exactly where") or hadn't a clue what we were going on about. The second point could possibly be dealt with by staff training but the first is a little more serious.

I wonder if it has something to do with how Cask Marque is perceived by the pub industry and how the pub industry is organised in the first place. 

As mentioned in the last post, it was no surprise to see the majority of Cask Marque pubs we visited were dominated by 4 massive pub chains. But even following on from that, the next groups of pubs were all chains as well. It's rather scary to see from my evidence that only 2 or 3 pubs seemed to be either free houses or tiny 3-4 pub chains.  

Now don't get me wrong, there was nothing wrong with the chains (I'm not going to touch on the whole issue of the beer tie or anything) per say, most were well run and the beer quality good but I wonder if gaining Cask Marque accreditation is as much of a boon for the single free house as it is for the chain? 

How Cask Marque goes about dealing with this is a puzzler for Alistair and the gang but I hope they continue to make gaining accreditation just as worthwhile and possible for every pub and not just those being run as part of a chain.

 But a further word about those chains, again referring back to Counting the Scores we saw that the "winning" chain, if that's the right expression was TaylorWalker with 26 pubs appearing on the tour; this was closely followed by Nicholson’s with 22 and Fuller’s with 19 and Greene King with 15. There's a well documented issue with chains in that they usually try to stamp a corporate brand onto all locations sometimes without a care for the origins of the pub or building, but I think I can happily report that maybe the days of someone like Watneys coming in a painting everything that moves “Watney Red” have now gone. Most of the chains still try to do a uniform decor job but I saw many fine examples where this had been done around and in harmony with the history of the pub and it was actually quite comforting to know that some of our very valuable pubs are safely in the hands on such caring companies. Want an example? Well how about the Ye Olde Mitre Inn which Fullers are obviously lavishing care and attention on, or the Argyll Arms whose fantastic ceilings and huge mirrors are polished lovingly by Nicholson’s. And in that analysis we see the two companies who I felt were doing the best jobs from the 4 majors. Now if Taylor Walker took on a “no blaring music policy” and Greene King a much more “extensive guest beer policy” then they could possibly catch up! 

But if we really want to give out prizes for the best places, then we need to "GO" back in time.....so let me take you on a journey......a magical journey....just close your eyes......(to be continued)

Counting the scores

So as the late great Larry Grayson might have said, "What are the scores on the doors?" and providing he was referring to the black and white statistics about the Monopoly Tour then lucky I'm in a position to don a black bob wig and do my best Isla St Clair.

The tour lasted for almost exactly a year, 367 days to be absolutely precise and it covered a total of 39 of the 40 squares on the Monopoly Board, this included all properties, all stations, all chances, all community chests, all utilities and even jail, go to jail and free parking. As hinted in the last blog post, we are still yet to cover "GO" but that will be done as a grand finale to the whole shebang and won’t be covering any new pubs.

During those 39 square we (or I) visited a grand total of 137 different pubs, one of which, the Artillery Arms was covered twice; once for Community Chest #1 and once again for Super Tax. The most pubs ever covered by one square were 6 but we did this 4 times when we visited Bow Street, Fleet Street, Leicester Square and Oxford Street. The least amount of pubs was just the 1 when I started the whole thing off in Old Kent Road on my own.

The tour (or maybe it was my charm and charisma) managed to attract a total of 43 different tourists (even I was surprised by that!) and a huge 60.5% of those came back for a second visit. The most tourists we ever had on a single square was 13 when we rolled up to Super Tax and the least, discounting any tours I made on my own, was 2 when it was just me and Spikey Haired Ed who conquered the WaterWorks square.

In terms of Cask Marque statistics, which I know Alistair will be greatly interested in, I started the tour with a total of 34 scans and now at the end I'm at 208. Obviously that includes other pubs I've been scanning outside of the tour, so maybe I (and Cask Marque) should be more proud of the scanners we introduced to the delights of the Cask Finder app; Micky, Charlie both have enough scans for their bottle openers. Ed should be cutting a fine figure of a bloating young man in his Polo Shirt (Pul-low - oh how we still laugh!) and Aussie Pete has been promoted to the dizzying heights of Cask Marque Ambassador with his brewery tour prize just around the corner! 

The longest run of consecutive scans was 7 which again we did on 4 different occasions; From The Savoy Tup (Chance #1) to Euston Flyer (Euston Road) – Ye Olde Watling (Change #2) to Ye Olde Cock Tavern (Fleet Street) – Nellie Dean of Soho (Oxford Street) to Spread Eagle (Bond Street) – Coach and Horses (Bond Street) to Sir Christopher Hatton (Chance #3).

 

Well done to all those pubs for getting the certificate out for the lads! Unfortunately that does mean that 28.5% of pubs for some reason or other did not have their certificate out for display and scanning, but I'll go into that in more details in a future post. 

The pubs we covered have been dominated by 4 major pub chains, in order of number of pubs that appeared on the tour Taylor Walker ran away with 1st prize chalking up 26 pubs, this was closely followed by Nicholson’s on 22, Fuller’s and Greene King coming in 3^rd and 4^th on 19 and 15 pubs respectively. 

None of this I guess is really surprising as all 4 have a traditional presence in the capital or the south of the country (ok maybe not so traditionally Greene King but they're never slow in seeking an opportunity)  - What I guess is most disappointing is to see so few truly free houses on the tour. 

But of course numbers never tell the true story, although geeky people like me love to crunch them in a thousand different ways, and of course how could one sum up the experience of 137 different pubs by numbers alone. So there is of course a human story behind these facts and figures. And for that we need another post.