Reflecting, the morning after, on the recent Morning Adverti

Firstly, and strikingly, the people. Licensees today are so much more professional. Running a pub now represents a career, and not something to retire into after a lifetime in the police or the armed forces. Company management is much better trained and more professional too. Although the guests at the MA awards proved that we still know how to let our hair down, I wonder, however, if there are as many remarkable characters around. I recall, for example, the licensee of a pub in Hammersmith who, having allowed ample drinking up time, would himself finish off the drinks of any recalcitrant customers. Quite a deterrent to malingering, although, on reflection, perhaps we are better off without such characters. Pubs, of course, in those days were purely, beer-based, (and generally keg beer), with food a novelty. It was often only in free houses that the offering was more sophisticated than a large jar of prehistoric-looking pickled eggs lurking threateningly on the bar. There is another respect in which change has been just as profound as that in the people, and this is in the level of capital spending on pubs. In the old days money was only ever spent on one of three things ­ paying off a tenant so that the pub could be placed under management, knocking two bars into one, so as to get rid of public bar prices, and to meet statutory requirements to improve toilets. Indeed, I recall management consultants arriving at Whitbread at that time, analysing the figures, and observing "you are not in the pub business, you are in the toilet business". Well, all that changed through the 1980s and since. Literally billions have been invested in search of new consumers and local market share. Much of this has been well spent, improving the customer offering beyond measure. Alongside clever investment, there has, sadly, been a lot of bone-headed investment too, creating pubs that customers reject. I can think of several properties that have appeared in any number of different incarnations within a few years, the owners losing a packet in the process. The current difficulties in the high street, with steep rents combining with over-investment to produce financial trouble, show the folly of this. Returning to the MA awards, it was refreshing, therefore, to see Geronimo Inns scooping the small-chain award. From my experience, Geronimo focuses on quality food and drink at reasonable prices. The pub interiors are comfortable but simple, with no fancy or expensive fittings. A good formula for attracting and satisfying customers whilst making money at the same time.