Smoking ban wears thin

An unexpected side effect of the ban on smoking in pubs is arising from the break-out of "the Wigan Traipse" - and now staff in a number of the town's bars are asking customers to pick up their feet.

Smokers are clocking up around 250 miles a week traipsing from the bar to the designated outdoor smoking area - and now one pub company's patience with smokers is wearing a bit thin.

"We've studied this carefully, and the damage to floors is all down to walking style," said Tony Callaghan, founder and managing director of Wigan-based Yesteryear Pub Company, which has bars across the north west of England.

"You can see reluctance in their body language as they walk out to have a smoke - it's a definite reluctant shuffling traipse, with foot contact on the floor probably twice as long as it needs to be.

"If they walked instead of shuffled, they'd get through their fag and back to their pint a lot sooner. If matters don't improve soon, I fear we may have to put up 'walk properly' signs next to the 'no smoking' signs.

"On average, there is a rolling 100 customers smoking outside each bar each day, and they make 20 visits each a day to the outside smoking area, an average return traipse of 32 yards. This equates to about 250 traipse miles per week."

A month after the English smoke ban came into effect, Tony says business levels are unaffected, but there is a slight change in customer trends.

Yesteryear, which owns the Number Fifteen chain of wine bars, Maloneys cocktail bars and a range of independently branded pubs and bars in the North West, says that July sales figures appear to have suffered no impact from the ban.

Tony said: "We really did not know what to expect. Some of our bars are in real smokers' heartlands - but business levels have remained unchanged. The change in emphasis has been more people coming into bars for food, and a notable increase in family dining.

"The hardcore smokers are obviously nonplussed by it all, but they are accepting the ban with good grace."