'Judge me by results'

Robert Breare, the man in charge of Noble House, has a lot to say to those who claim his business is less than healthy. By Mark Stretton.

Robert Breare wants to set the record straight. His business is not about to go bust nor are his banks and backers "baulking" over the cool £1m the Noble House entrepreneur is spending each week on growing and regenerating his pub estate.

It is fair to say that Robert is incandescent about reports suggesting that the company is geared up to the eyeballs, perhaps beyond. "It's ridiculous," he spits. "We were not even asked about current trading and then one Sunday morning I pick up a paper and read that our trading has fallen off a cliff."

Noble House Pub Company is one third of the way through a capital expenditure programme, spending an average of £150,000 on each pub. "Our strategy has not changed from day one," he says. "We buy tired but fundamentally sound pubs and reinvigorate them with capital."

The Noble pubs yet to see any cash are trading well on a like-for-like sales basis, he says. "We were down in July, up by three per cent in August, down one per cent in September, and down three per cent in October. The trading pattern is rock solid, it doesn't change and I believe the pubs are outperforming the market."

The businesses that have been refurbished are seeing a 30 per cent uplift in sales. "That is not just a trading week plucked out of thin air but an average. I'll hold these numbers up against anyone. Trading has definitely not fallen off a cliff," Robert says.

The Noble House strategy has seen Robert buy chunky pub packages and then dispose of the ones he doesn't want, a risky business if you don't get it right. The company recouped £67m from pubs sold on to other operators, against projections of £57m. The Noble boss is used to press comment, and accepts that he rubs some people up the wrong way. "The popularity stakes have never been important to me," he says. "At the end of the day I'll be judged on results. All the fuss with the Wolves stuff and perhaps the fact that I'm not particularly backward in coming forward might not help."

The "Wolves stuff" was the 12 months he spent stalking the brewer and pub operator Wolverhampton & Dudley. As we all know Wolves escaped but it was a terrific experience, says Robert.

As the battle for Wolves raged Robert also worked on the £100m Scottish & Newcastle deal. "That was a hectic time," he says. "That was several months of working day and night."

Noble House is actually split into two companies - Leisure, which has 21 restaurants, and Pub Company, which has 140 pubs. This is for practical reasons, says Robert. "When we teamed up with Pubmaster for the Wolves deal we had to move very quickly. Pubmaster didn't have time to carry out due diligence on Leisure so we formed a new company with our existing backers, Botts & Co."

He is late registering accounts at Companies House for Leisure, another cause of suspicion. This was because he planned to merge the two companies into one. This will happen next year.

Robert is certainly not shy, but nor is he abrasive. A strategist with a pretty impressive entrepreneurial track record, he possibly does not receive the respect or recognition he might deserve.

After reading economics at Cambridge, he went to work for the family publishing business, which he later bought in a deal backed by venture capitalist John Moulten. After successfully growing and selling two newspaper businesses he was then headhunted by property company Parkdale.

"We aggressively grew a hotel group until the end of the eighties when we felt the market was getting a bit cold," Robert says. The business was sold but the team stayed together to form Arcadian, launching concurrent hotel ventures in England, France, Italy and Spain. This was sold to a US hotel group in 1998.

He also teamed up with Ken McCulloch to launch Malmaison, and with Terence Conran to launch the £70m Great Eastern Hotel project. He believes the pub industry has a lot to learn from the hotel game.

"Providing good customer service is the really big skill - finding people to manage your pubs who really care," Robert says. "You too often see publicans who think it's a shame to break into their privacy. The challenge is to provide a great experience that isn't five-star but that also isn't complete tat."

The Noble House boss teamed up with John Moulten, now with private equity group Alchemy, to run the Ushers of Trowbridge business. This was then split into Refresh UK, the drinks group, and InnSpired, the tenanted pub business.

But Robert says the tenanted or leased end of the business leaves him cold. "It's a bit clinical and you are not near the customer," he says. "I get all my drive from the managed business - being involved with the food, drink, dècor and the hospitality.

"We spent six months researching, designing and planning the Jim Thompson's and Yellow River Café concepts and six months testing them." He sees leasehold versus freehold as one of the great debates of the industry. "Everyone says that leasehold is best - that it gives the best returns - that's only true if you get it absolutely spot on," Robert says.

"If not, leases can be a millstone around the neck, as everyone is seeing at the moment with various companies. In Pub Company we're sticking like glue to our rule of a 75 per cent freehold mix."

Despite his past successes and consequent wealth, Robert still rises to a challenge. "I'm sure I'd be far less alive if I wasn't stimulated," he says. "I love the challenge of setting out with a group of people, trying out new ideas and seeing customers respond.

"It's appalling if they don't but it's great if you get it right. I still get this enormous, quite childish, thrill out of seeing one of our pubs or restaurants absolutely heaving."

Robert says the current climate almost mirrors that of 10 years ago. "We are going through a bit of a tough time and you could make a case that we are in recession. What is different this time is interest rates are at a level where people are not compelled to sell at any level. There will not be the same opportunities to buy a bust company and sell it during the boom."

The rapid rise of Noble House has given him a reputation for bidding for anything with a beer pump. "In the last six months we have looked at more than 1,000 pubs and bought six. We are not like a bunch of kids in a sweetie shop with too much money.

"Everything is going to plan. I'll be judged on the results I deliver," he repeats.