Ordering a pint of Outer Haze from Dark Star Brewery at The Globe Pub in London’s Moorgate resulted in an attractive looking pale beer placed on the bar. It was also sufficiently cold to the touch that I was very pleased with my selection.

 

I need not have worried on this occasion, because I was at the post-drinks reception of The Future of Cask Seminar, the annual event held nearby by Cask Marque, which monitors beer quality for cask ale around the country. If my Outer Haze had been warm and flat, then we might as well all give up on this quintessential taste of Britain that is going through some very tough times.

 

The problem is that even Cask Marque-accredited pubs aren’t great at delivering the perfect pint. Only 68% achieve a four or five-star rating when the inspectors turn up and do their testing. Don’t forget these are the best pubs in the business of serving real ale, but even many of them continue to suffer from the three key problems – incorrect temperature, insufficiently fresh beer and a poor level of glass care/washing.

 

This inability to deliver the product from the cellar to the customers’ glass in the quality expected is the fundamental problem behind the product being replaced on bars by less sensitive lager and keg beer. These competitor drinks are not live, fresh products and therefore so much easier to deal with than cask ale. Consider food being thrown on a plate and served at the wrong temperature in a restaurant, and I reckon we’d all find that unacceptable. It would certainly affect our future purchasing decisions.

 

The post-covid-19 sales figures show a poor situation for what many people (especially visitors to the UK) would describe as the national alcoholic drink. It is currently achieving only 78% of its 2019 volumes compared with the likes of premium lager at 111% and Guinness at 112%, according to the British Beer & Pub Association. This simply highlights the continuation of the ongoing poor sales performance of cask, which are 50% smaller than in 2007, when the first Cask Report was published. If we play this trend forward, then within five years, sales of Guinness could well be larger than the whole of the cask category.

 

Such is the concern for the survival of cask in any meaningful form that there is the possibility that its future existence might only be secured by a focus on its presence in specific regional strongholds, where demand is high and in pubs that actively champion the product. For me, the latter specifically means training staff in pubs to handle the product correctly. The fact is it is hardly rocket science. 

 

The biggest champion is JD Wetherspoon, and the driving force behind cask remaining a significant feature in its pubs is founder Tim Martin, who has worked with Cask Marque since 1999. The company is certainly zealous in its efforts to train its bar staff to deliver cask at the optimum condition to customers.

 

According to James Ullman, personnel and retail audit director at Wetherspoon, it is proud to have earned an average 4.99 score across its pubs on its food hygiene rating (from the Food Standards Agency) and probably wins more awards than any business for the quality of its toilets. He says it has the same focus on its beer quality, and a drive this year has pushed the number of its pubs hitting four or five stars from Cask Marque from 72% in April to 95% in July. This is an incredible performance when you consider this encompasses 830 pubs.

 

Such is its focus on cask that the aspiration is for every pub to hit a target of selling 2,000 pints of the beer every week. Ullman acknowledges this is “aspirational” for many pubs, but at the very least, they are all typically achieving a third of beer sales from cask. Its efforts ensure that I have every confidence that when my hand touches that pint glass in any Wetherspoon pub, it will be sufficiently cool and will also be in good condition.

 

Its ability to deliver something that so many other pubs in the industry fail to do – despite it suffering from exactly the same high levels of staff turnover as others – sets the benchmark for other pub companies to follow. The big question is, do they really want to follow? The answer to this might just well determine whether cask drinking remains a mainstream activity or, sadly, becomes a minority sport.

Those that work in the sector often talk about catching the hospitality bug. The love of the industry makes them stay in it or come back to it time and time again. Even some of the most successful entrepreneurs and investors return to start up new ventures, try new challenges or invest in what they hope will be the “next big thing”. Familiarity does not, it seems, in the case of our sector, breed contempt. 

 

The Propel Multi-Site Database has now grown to include 2,983 companies, which operate 71,251 sites. An additional 55 companies, which operate 621 sites between them, were added during September 2023. Many of these businesses are led by those who have caught the hospitality bug and have returned to start a new journey in the sector.

 

Oliver Norcliffe is a former operations manager at bakery and café concept Gail’s. He recently secured a second site in London for his fledgling pan-Asian, all-day concept, Ollie’s House. It has secured an ex-Megan’s site in Parsons Green for an opening this year. Norcliffe, who spent more than four and a half years at Gail’s, launched the Ollie’s House concept on the former Cote site in Fulham Road, Chelsea, last year. The concept is described as being inspired by “Bali resorts with a pan-Asian menu featuring noodles, curries and more”. 

 

At the same time, Jack & Alice, the all-day dining and wine bar concept from Mark and Vanessa Hall, has opened its second site, in Farnham, Surrey. Earlier this year, Jack & Alice secured the ex-The Botanist site in Town Hall Buildings in The Borough. It is understood the business plans further expansion over the coming years. Founded in 2015 with a pop-up in Fitzrovia, Mark Hall opened the first site in Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, later the same year. The Halls have partnered with Tony Gualtieri, former managing director of Cubitt House, previously of Green King and Mitchells & Butlers, who joined Jack & Alice as co-owner and director. It is understood additional funding has been secured from a number of sector-focused individuals to aid the expansion of the business. Mark Hall was previously group operations director at Splendid Restaurants and retail director for Mitchells & Butlers, while Vanessa Hall, who was previously chief executive at YO! and Vapiano SE, is currently a non-executive director of Rare Restaurants, the Gaucho brand owner.

 

The hospitality bug also means that established single site operators are still on the lookout to extend their own “little empires” – if they get the right opportunity. South London brunch spot The Table was launched by Paul Appleton, at 83 Southwark Street, in 2006. Appleton, alongside co-owner Venus Loudon, has now opened a second site after 17 years, at 35-37 Battersea Rise, London, which features an outdoor terrace. The new site is serving brunch options made with high-quality locally sourced ingredients. Newcastle bakery FAB, which stands for fresh artisan bread and is owned by Shynara Bakisheva, opened its debut site at 36 Fenham Hall Drive in Fenham in the summer of 2020. The business is now set to double up with an opening in Ashburton Road, Gosforth. 

 

Restaurateur Nima Safei is behind Italian restaurant 40 Dean Street. Safei has now launched his second site, in London’s Soho, called 64 Old Compton Street. The new site serves a “simple, appealing menu of classic Italian dishes, affordably priced”. Asian restaurant concept Uli, which is owned by Singaporean restaurateur Michael Lim, opened its debut site in Notting Hill’s All Saints Road in 1997 before moving to new premises in Ladbroke Road a few years ago. The company has now opened a second site, in Marylebone’s Seymour Village. 

 

And then there are those who have been successful and now want to back a new generation of entrepreneurs. The After School Cookie Club, originally launched as Humble Dough by founder Jesse Jenkins, rebranded in 2019 and launched into Boxpark Croydon and Boxpark Shoreditch. It is described as the “first vegan and gluten-free cookie brand”. It recently opened a site in Borough Yards and has a further opening lined up in Victoria. It is understood the business is in talks on a further site in the capital and that it will eventually explore growth via franchising. John Vincent, co-founder and former chief executive of Leon, the healthy fast-food chain, has invested in the plant-based cookie concept.

 

Talking to one sector entrepreneur, they admitted they could not just “go and sit on a beach somewhere” but needed the “buzz and interaction” that the sector continually provided. They still felt the need to try new things and “give something back”. The bug had indeed got them bad. Thankfully, it continues to embrace plenty more hospitality operators, both old and new. 

We are seeing the impacts of climate change now, from the extreme heat and wildfires to flooding across Europe, with 60,000 excess deaths from heat in Europe reported last year. The extreme weather is impacting our sector in every area – from the supply of key ingredients to physical risks to our properties, and from the expectations of our investors, teams and customers to changing holiday travel patterns. Some 50% of 18 to 24-year-olds think the climate crises will collapse civilisation in their lifetime, which might explain why so many of them choose employers that are taking climate action and leave those that don’t. 

 

In the two years since we launched the sector’s roadmap to net zero, it’s great to see the progress we’ve made in taking action to reduce our emissions in response to the climate crises. Helping our members measure their emissions, then create and implement credible plans to net zero based on action not offsetting, is the founding purpose of the forum.  

 

On energy, the shift to buying renewable power, on-site generation and engaging teams to waste less energy – from operational practices and collaborating to understand the best technologies we can implement to reduce use – has saved more than 500,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide across our members. Taking action to cut carbon and costs from lower energy use has, for many operators, helped them survive the energy crises and recover lost profits worth thousands per outlet, while tackling the climate crises.

 

We know the many obstacles that remain to reach net zero on energy, such as the capital required to fund the transition to all electric operations and the availability of energy capacity to our locations. We’re fortunate to have the best advocates for our industry across the British Beer & Pub Association, UKHospitality and the British Institute of Innkeepers, and we work to support them with the evidence to engage government on funding the transition.

 

While we progress at pace on energy, up to 90% of emissions are in our supply chain, and much of it from the food and drink we serve. Globally, an estimated 35% of carbon emissions are from food and drink, as well as being the primary cause of habitat loss. Implementing the changes in the production and consumption of what we eat and drink will be critical if we are to maintain a habitable planet. Through the number of people we employ and engage with every day and our global supply chains, we are uniquely placed as a sector to drive those changes.

 

Combining our members’ initiatives alongside the guidance of our sustainability experts, including Mike Berners-Lee and Mike Barry, our climate action plans detail all the individual actions that operators can take to reduce their impact. Re-engineering menus, changing or eliminating ingredients, engaging suppliers and menu carbon labelling will drive reductions. But the transformational changes we need in areas such as meat and dairy and engaging consumers will require collaborative action.  

 

At our chief executive roundtable this week, we discussed our collective initiatives, what further action we can take and how we can secure support from government and customers to make the changes we need.

 

To help drive that collaboration, we have established action groups to understand how we can accelerate the move to regenerative agriculture across our supply chain; to set consistent targets and requests of our suppliers on climate action; and to tackle specific hotspots, including dairy and use of soy in chicken feed.

 

We recognise the need to bring suppliers on the journey with us. We are engaging suppliers through a number of means. Our supplier marketplace supports members to connect with the providers of low carbon products and services across the 155 initiatives we’ve identified, as well as driving action across our supply chain. We have engaged suppliers directly and run webinars with suppliers and supplier groups to share learnings and build connections. And we have engaged sector bodies in our supply chain, such as DairyUK and the National Farmers’ Union, to collectively improve our understanding of requirements and reduce product related emissions.

 

It's a journey, but in collaboration as a sector, bringing as many people with us as we can from across the value chain, we can build more sustainable and resilient businesses that people will want to work for, buy from and invest in. Last week’s government announcements show that the climate crises will be solved through sectors collaborating to define a path to net zero and working together to implement it.