The Pub trade is dying - Minimum price for Alcohol?

senordingdong

TheyKnowMyIP wrote: »

Any pub that sells supermarket beer/spirits should be closed down imo.

For being greedy or for trying to be competitive?

Weissbier

senordingdong wrote: »

TheyKnowMyIP wrote: »

Any pub that sells supermarket beer/spirits should be closed down imo.

For being greedy or for trying to be competitive?

I would think for being greedy!!! These €1 approx bottles of beer are still being sold at full price, no deal to the customer!!!!

Let's be honest the publicans have brought all this on themselves! If they really have problems with what they pay for their products, then maybe they should get back to their suppliers for a better price, afterall the VFI is a very big organisation.

TheyKnowMyIP

Yes, pubs that offer little to the consumer should fail. It's a free market after all. This will result in the pubs that can compete and offer great value to their customers to stay around. Publicans were generally greedy during the boom times. People were spending, they were taking it in. Now that we have hit hard times, more will need to be done to keep their edge.

I still don't think the pub will fade into irrelevance though. The boozing culture is simply too ingrained into the irish mindset. The only limiting factor this mindset at the moment, is the empty wallet. Things will come around again. For now, it's not reasonable to overcharge people. If this is the case, don't go out. They will have to get the message eventually.

sasta le

Im in the trade
Yes we can buy bottles from a supermarket as long as they are 33oml bottles and get proper receipt.However most bottles have been put to 300ml to stop this

I buy 330ml Miller from a wholesaler in Galway and it is supermarket stock but they have a bonded company i.e have a licence to bring it in

mikemac

When I was a hotel barman the toilets were checked hourly.
And while you'll read threads on boards that Irish people are lazy and won't work bad jobs, that was my job, I cleaned them, put me through college as a hotel barman

Some are a disgrace

Graingers, Amiens Street Dublin, I'm looking at you
Right across the road from the IFSC and over ten thousand office staff beside you. You serve bar food and huge potential for a roaring lunchtime trade.

The toilets are a disgrace, the worst I've seen in Dublin.
And so the pub is avoided by many I know on the basis of if that's how clean you keep the place, what is your kitchen like??
The best bars will pull through the current time and the worst will sit back moaning and wondering what went wrong without even looking at themselves

Weissbier

sasta le wrote: »

Im in the trade
Yes we can buy bottles from a supermarket as long as they are 33oml bottles and get proper receipt.However most bottles have been put to 300ml to stop this

I buy 330ml Miller from a wholesaler in Galway and it is supermarket stock but they have a bonded company i.e have a licence to bring it in

In fact the 300ml bottles are a bit more rare than lead on but fair enough they do appear to catch out the foolish, I've seen a 275ml from Corona last year. And another thing is the strength of beer, sometimes less.

However, when I worked in a bar a few years ago and everytime the government put up duty 5p the pubs used to add another 10p also, can you explain?? and on occasions the Vitners sometimes decided to put on a rise also in the middle of a year!! Why?

ardinn

Weissbier wrote: »

In fact the 300ml bottles are a bit more rare than lead on but fair enough they do appear to catch out the foolish, I've seen a 275ml from Corona last year. And another thing is the strength of beer, sometimes less.

However, when I worked in a bar a few years ago and everytime the government put up duty 5p the pubs used to add another 10p also, can you explain?? and on occasions the Vitners sometimes decided to put on a rise also in the middle of a year!! Why?

The vintners put a rise???

The vintners dont rise anything - they have no control over the price you retail at, I need a banging head against a brick wall smiley!

Hank Scorpio

Saw off licence advertised beside a pub a few days ago and walked in. It was basically a Pub and a little cupboard with cans. Long story short, he wanted 17 euro something for 8 cans of Carlsberg and wasnt stocking anything cheaper.

Why advertise with an off licence sign outside if you're selling full on pub prices for the cans.

Went to another place and got them for 10 euro

bobbysands81

rubadub wrote: »

In most cases when you buy a 24 pack its a different bottle, labelled as a multipack and not to be sold individually, so techinically a different barcoded product, even if the same ml and %, they could also sell 300ml bottles in boxes, which many do. So I doubt they could force them to sell the bottles singly as they could argue the distributor will no longer supply them (it is legal to sell multipack beers though). The real saving is usually on these larger boxes. Most people buy over 5 at a time anyways so its no problem having them at the same price bulk or not. In O'Briens the cheaper beers usually have no bulk discount.

I don't understand how "minimum pricing" works anway. Do you just mean a ban on below cost selling? which then forces them to charge at the duty & VAT price (as the breweries can still charge very little if they want to).

If they go too high people will just go north.

To reiterate - cost savings will not be realised for multiple purchases.

Example - If 1 bottle costs €2, 5 bottles can only be sold for €10. No free bottles can be given out, no '3 for 2' offers.

If 4 cans are sold for €5, then IF single cans are sold they MUST be sold for €1.25 each otherwise they can only sell multiple packs and not single cans.

Below cost selling to be banned.

Minimum prices will be set based on the alcohol content of the product.

Tax will increase.

All this info is clearly out in the public domain folks.

Ministerial discussions to take place in an attempt to formulate an all-Ireland alcohol policy.

rubadub wrote: »

Why would they be exempt, is this just a presumption they do not engage in below cost selling? diceys in dublin have €2 pints of paulaner which I believe could be below cost. I did not see anything in your links mentioning pubs being exempt.

Pubs supply drink in a controlled atmosphere. In theory there are restrictions on the amount of alcohol you can purchase in one go... for instance no barman is going to serve you 8 shots of Vodka in a pint glass, but in an Off-Licence you can go in and buy as many bottles as you want and serve them to yourself any way you want. In a pub you have a 'responsible server'. Pubs employ about ten times the amount of folk that Off-Licences do etc...

StudentDad

bobbysands81 wrote: »

rubadub wrote: »

In most cases when you buy a 24 pack its a different bottle, labelled as a multipack and not to be sold individually, so techinically a different barcoded product, even if the same ml and %, they could also sell 300ml bottles in boxes, which many do. So I doubt they could force them to sell the bottles singly as they could argue the distributor will no longer supply them (it is legal to sell multipack beers though). The real saving is usually on these larger boxes. Most people buy over 5 at a time anyways so its no problem having them at the same price bulk or not. In O'Briens the cheaper beers usually have no bulk discount.

I don't understand how "minimum pricing" works anway. Do you just mean a ban on below cost selling? which then forces them to charge at the duty & VAT price (as the breweries can still charge very little if they want to).

If they go too high people will just go north.

To reiterate - cost savings will not be realised for multiple purchases.

Example - If 1 bottle costs €2, 5 bottles can only be sold for €10. No free bottles can be given out, no '3 for 2' offers.

If 4 cans are sold for €5, then IF single cans are sold they MUST be sold for €1.25 each otherwise they can only sell multiple packs and not single cans.

Below cost selling to be banned.

Minimum prices will be set based on the alcohol content of the product.

Tax will increase.

All this info is clearly out in the public domain folks.

Ministerial discussions to take place in an attempt to formulate an all-Ireland alcohol policy.

rubadub wrote: »

Why would they be exempt, is this just a presumption they do not engage in below cost selling? diceys in dublin have €2 pints of paulaner which I believe could be below cost. I did not see anything in your links mentioning pubs being exempt.

Pubs supply drink in a controlled atmosphere. In theory there are restrictions on the amount of alcohol you can purchase in one go... for instance no barman is going to serve you 8 shots of Vodka in a pint glass, but in an Off-Licence you can go in and buy as many bottles as you want and serve them to yourself any way you want. In a pub you have a 'responsible server'. Pubs employ about ten times the amount of folk that Off-Licences do etc...

All this talk of 'minimum pricing' just sounds like the bar trade can't cut it in a free market.

If plans to try and force businesses to sell alcohol products at a fixed minimum price go ahead that to my mind is price fixing, a distortion of the market.

For me it's very simple, either a pub sells its products at a level the market will tolerate or it goes out of business.

Putting an artificial floor under prices just penalises pubs that are willing to compete and ultimately won't work because people will find an alternate source for drink and still won't spend in overpriced pubs.

Nobody has a god given right to trade in a given industry. Either compete or get out.

SD

Weissbier

ardinn wrote: »

Weissbier wrote: »

In fact the 300ml bottles are a bit more rare than lead on but fair enough they do appear to catch out the foolish, I've seen a 275ml from Corona last year. And another thing is the strength of beer, sometimes less.

However, when I worked in a bar a few years ago and everytime the government put up duty 5p the pubs used to add another 10p also, can you explain?? and on occasions the Vitners sometimes decided to put on a rise also in the middle of a year!! Why?

The vintners put a rise???

The vintners dont rise anything - they have no control over the price you retail at, I need a banging head against a brick wall smiley!

Excuse my ignorance! I assumed it was the Vitners as all the local pubs put the price up equally, based on your reply and my experience, a more correct statement would be that the local cartel of pubs put up the price!!

Apologies for the error!

bucketybuck

bobbysands81 wrote: »

Below cost selling to be banned.

Minimum prices will be set based on the alcohol content of the product.

Tax will increase.

All this info is clearly out in the public domain folks.

Ministerial discussions to take place in an attempt to formulate an all-Ireland alcohol policy.

Once again, cite? All you offered previously were unsubstantiated media reports commenting on one statement from a minister. You are stating the above as given facts, would you care to provide some evidence for this?

kissthesky

TheyKnowMyIP wrote: »

Funny about how people were willing to lash out the 50's when we had money, yet now, "**** the pubs" is common. People are hypocrites. People squander their money in various different forms. Utter stupidity.

One thing is for certain though, the vast majority of people don't have two pennies to rub together now. Bitching and moaning after you were gouged by Publicans, Yeah, that is real smart. The publican put a gun to your head:rolleyes:

The economic crisis and the smoking ban play a massive part in the decline of the Irish pub. If we still had money, people would not be complaining. Everybody is responsible at least to some degree for this mess, including the publicans. Debt = Money!

Bang on the money with this. I worked in pubs until very recently and lads would come in and if they dropped a fiver they couldnt be bothered to pick it up. Pull out another 50eu and rocked on. Get a grip OP's . Things are tight and you cant afford it now. Accept it and move on. All this bull**** about ' i can get 10 cans for 10 eu' at the off licence. Well then do that and stop whinging about pubs. As for some other poster saying that pubs are not innovative and should turn their spare room into a crash out zone..... Spare me. Have you even begun to think what ur goin on about. I have the feeling that a lot of posters havent a clue about what is involved in running a pub or to be honest have a clue about being self employed. Pubs are a very emotive issue. I have just pulled out of the pub trade in Ireland after 20 years working from cleaning toilets as a 16yr old to owning to leasing pubs. Both here in Spain, London and Ireland. Believe me, looking back its ****. The hours, lack of a social life, constant stress about paying bills. Fair enough I loved it at the time. But the majority of people do not run a pub with the expectation of making a fortune. You do it because you want to make a wage and because you want to be self employed and all the good and bad things that this entails.
Also will people stop goin on about the VHI etc and pubs being cartels cos pubs are not involved in cartels. Put it this way. If I drive from Tipperary Town to Thurles and a breakfast roll costs 3.50€ in Tipp Town and the same one in Thurles is 3.80€ or even the same price, do I start bleating about cartels, price gouging etc. No I dont.
Do I say, well that roll is 3.80€ but I can get a roll in the supermarket for 20 cents and a packet of bacon for 1.80 and a packet of sausages for 2€ and make my own roll and maybe another six rolls for the price i have paid for just one ready made roll? No I dont cos no one has put a gun to my head and made me walk into a deli etc and made me hand over my 3.80€ Its the same with pub ffs.

saywhatyousee

Pub's are the only business i know that can charge a 400% or more markup on items and still complain about not making enough.I used to work in a pub and i used to take in deliveries i know exactly what the items cost.
Bottles of beer between 80c and 1.05 miller the cheapest heineken the most expensive
Coca cola ect cost 48c a bottle
A litre of Smirnoff was 19
A case of 12 pint bottles was 19
These were 2007 prices aswell they are probaly cheaper now from the supplier.

rubadub

witnessmenow wrote: »

I can tell you with 100% certainty that it is true: buying bottles of the drink wholesalers is more expensive than the offers in super markets..

There is no law preventing wholesalers charging less than supermarkets, therefore you are wrong with your "100% certainty" nonsense. "Offers in supermarkets" is vague/meaningless and I imagine publicans often do get drinks cheaper than supermarket prices, which can be up around €2 a bottle, wholesalers also have "offers". Can any publican tell us what they pay for a bottle of satzenbrau? its in most pubs. We had figures on heineken before, it was higher than the supermarket offers I mentioned, some will be higher some lower, as you would expect.

witnessmenow wrote: »

Im pretty sure there is a an excise on drink sold in pubs, which is included in the price off the wholesaler.

The exact same excise is charged in supermarkets too.

witnessmenow wrote: »

I said a pub cant buy it as cheap as a consumer. A customer buys the beer at X, the pub buys it at X plus has to pay Y duty..... how is what i said wrong? I never said the couldnt buy it, i said they couldnt buy it as cheap.

You are wrong, the duty is paid by consumers/publicans in supermarkets.

witnessmenow wrote: »

Once a beer hits less €1 a bottle or less you can be guaranteed its cheaper.

Why? seems you are just guessing again, but seem "100% certain" about it again.

Like I said earlier centra's were selling heineken 20 for €15 and I doubt very much it was a loss leader -i.e. people were not doing their weekly shop in centra and picking up a crate with it. But you are trying to guarantee me they were losing over €5 on each sale. I find that incredible.

ardinn

Weissbier wrote: »

Excuse my ignorance! I assumed it was the Vitners as all the local pubs put the price up equally, based on your reply and my experience, a more correct statement would be that the local cartel of pubs put up the price!!

Apologies for the error!

Generally a VAT increase, but your ignorance is excused!

ArmaniJeanss

Cheap supermarket alcohol back on the agenda, typical Fianna Fa Labour being in the pocket of the vintners. Minister Shortall wants to look at a minimum price 'per ounce' of alcohol.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/minister-wants-to-impose-minimum-price-for-alcohol-524777.html

stovelid

If your business is failing, look at your costs and adapt or go out of fucking business.

Only in places like this country do trades like publicans and taxi-drivers automatically go whinging to the government to unfairly stifle competition and prop them up.

mikom

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

Cheap supermarket alcohol back on the agenda, typical Fianna Fa Labour being in the pocket of the vintners. Minister Shortall wants to look at a minimum price 'per ounce' of alcohol.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/minister-wants-to-impose-minimum-price-for-alcohol-524777.html

Groundbreaking......
The queen wins again.

cock robin

No sympathy for the publicans at all to be honest. I remember one time that you could make a call from a phone box for 5p and the phones in most pubs were charging 35p. The fcukers even wanted to make money on your phone call. They had it good for long enough, now let them suck it up.

msg11

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

Cheap supermarket alcohol back on the agenda, typical Fianna Fa Labour being in the pocket of the vintners. Minister Shortall wants to look at a minimum price 'per ounce' of alcohol.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/minister-wants-to-impose-minimum-price-for-alcohol-524777.html

Just heard this, is she trying to drive the supermarkets out of business too? **** sake, it's about making money, if you can't lower some (not all products are on offer) of your prices down to the same as the supermarkets then you are a rip off and quite frankly **** ye then.

As for this non sense about alcoholics and kids, what is she on about? Alcoholics will always buy drink even with a minimum price, and kids will always drink, we need a culture change not a minimum price on drink Christ sake.

If this comes in it's going to push shoppers back up North again, cheap beer up North, shopping maybe a little cheaper and you get a day out. Is this government retarded. The shopping up North has nearly come to a stop and they want to start it all back up again.

She's sick of supermarkets below price selling, oh sorry the supermarkets actully give you value for money. Sure **** it anyway, we may aswell but a minimum price on everything supermarkets sell cheaper than anywhere else. Lets have minmum prices on Bread, Milk, Fruit and Veg anything cheaper.

I tell you something for nothing this crowd won't be getting my vote again, they have done nothing they promised instead are sticking there snouts into things that they have no business doing. Finding problems that not only don't need fixing but are breaking them while there at it.

ardinn

msg11 wrote: »

Just heard this, is she trying to drive the supermarkets out of business too? **** sake, it's about making money, if you can't lower some (not all products are on offer) of your prices down to the same as the supermarkets then you are a rip off and quite frankly **** ye then.

The supermarkets are not making money tho - thats why they are called LOSS LEADERS

So how are pubs/independant off licences supposed to compete with that? I suppose you would be up for one supermarket selling everything below cost in one particular area, Effectively closing down all other grocery outlets in that area?

Makes sense, !!!

bobbysands81

msg11 wrote: »

Just heard this, is she trying to drive the supermarkets out of business too? **** sake, it's about making money, if you can't lower some (not all products are on offer) of your prices down to the same as the supermarkets then you are a rip off and quite frankly **** ye then.

As for this non sense about alcoholics and kids, what is she on about? Alcoholics will always buy drink even with a minimum price, and kids will always drink, we need a culture change not a minimum price on drink Christ sake.

If this comes in it's going to push shoppers back up North again, cheap beer up North, shopping maybe a little cheaper and you get a day out. Is this government retarded. The shopping up North has nearly come to a stop and they want to start it all back up again.

She's sick of supermarkets below price selling, oh sorry the supermarkets actully give you value for money. Sure **** it anyway, we may aswell but a minimum price on everything supermarkets sell cheaper than anywhere else. Lets have minmum prices on Bread, Milk, Fruit and Veg anything cheaper.

I tell you something for nothing this crowd won't be getting my vote again, they have done nothing they promised instead are sticking there snouts into things that they have no business doing. Finding problems that not only don't need fixing but are breaking them while there at it.

Look back at my previous posts on this thread... minimum pricing is only one thing that's going to happen, tax on off-sales will go up, savings on multiple purchases to be done away with, an all-Ireland alcohol policy to look at things like similar pricing in the two political jurisdictions and further restrictions on the sale and availability of alcohol.

Leftist

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

Cheap supermarket alcohol back on the agenda, typical Fianna Fa Labour being in the pocket of the vintners. Minister Shortall wants to look at a minimum price 'per ounce' of alcohol.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/minister-wants-to-impose-minimum-price-for-alcohol-524777.html

Now this, is a scumbag.

Awful, awful woman.

msg11

ardinn wrote: »

The supermarkets are not making money tho - thats why they are called LOSS LEADERS

So how are pubs/independant off licences supposed to compete with that? I suppose you would be up for one supermarket selling everything below cost in one particular area, Effectively closing down all other grocery outlets in that area?

Makes sense, !!!

They are making money, that's why it's called a loss leader. They sell a product at a loss to get you in and when your in there you buy other things, hopefully your weekly shop. That's the theory anyway.

But ardinn, it's business. It's not nice I agree one supermarket going in and wiping out a few shops. If people have such a problem with supermarkets doing this then it's as simple as this just don't shop in the supermarket and support the small shops. But your going to pay alot more in the smaller shop.

The government coming in and setting minimum prices on stuff is madness. If every product had a minimum price in that everyone bought from the supplier at the same price, the supermarkets will still be cheaper and the smaller shops will still be ripping people off, look at musgraves they own a fairly big chunk of the market and there shops have products so over priced and you know they are getting they off the supplier for nearly the same price as Dunnes and Tesco. And there Fruit and Veg prices are ludicrous I would go so far to say that there actully disgraceful. I once seen carrot's per KG at 4.99 and another at 5.99 KG.

I'm sorry I just don't buy this and think things should be left as they are, and these off licences complaining about it should get there act together.

I work in a supermarket and I shop in my local off licence, which is a pub off licence and believe it or not they are actully cheaper than the supermarket on what I drink, and nearly the same price on most other stuff.

They got there act together started doing deals and got there marketing in order, cause you get with the times. Some of these publicans and off licence owners are stuck in 2nd gear in 2006.

4leto

Is it just me who thinks alcohol is far to cheap. It is possible for me to buy 3 large bottles of spirit in a supermarket and get drunk for a week on 60€.

With those prices I am surprised we don't have bigger problems with alcohol in this country.

ardinn

My point waas they are not making money on alcohol, The only way to do deals in to buy in volume - and get a discount, unfortunately if they did that, then we would see leveling off in prices, leading to more "cartel" comments and the intervention of the competition authority! Again!

Leftist

4leto wrote: »

Is it just me who thinks alcohol is far to cheap. It is possible for me to buy 3 large bottles of spirit in a supermarket and get drunk for a week on 60€.

With those prices I am surprised we don't have bigger problems with alcohol in this country.

Why would you want three large bottles of spirits?

Its your problem if you can't tell yourself when to stop. Why should the rest of us over pay for the mistake of idiots that can't pace themselves?

I don't mean to be crass but put it into perspective.
over 1 euro for a beer in a supermarket is not cheap, not on the international scale.

We shouldn't have to pay for other's mistakes though and alcoholics will be alcoholics anyway. It'll just make them get in financial trouble quicker.

Any fool who thinks rising the price of alcohol will stop people drinking should not be given a public platform.
Unlike smoking, you can't push us all outside.

4leto

Leftist wrote: »

Why would you want three large bottles of spirits?

Its your problem if you can't tell yourself when to stop. Why should the rest of us over pay for the mistake of idiots that can't pace themselves?

I don't mean to be crass but put it into perspective.
over 1 euro for a beer in a supermarket is not cheap, not on the international scale.

We shouldn't have to pay for other's mistakes though and alcoholics will be alcoholics anyway. It'll just make them get in financial trouble quicker.

Any fool who thinks rising the price of alcohol will stop people drinking should not be given a public platform.
Unlike smoking, you can't push us all outside.

I wouldn't I was just making the point of how cheap alcohol actually is even here.

And price does have an influence on our behaviour for example although cigs are very bad for you the prime reason I stopped was because of the price of them.

Seachmall

4leto wrote: »

the prime reason I stopped was because of the price of them.

I'm stopping for the same reason, I'm also reducing my drinking due to prices.