Value demand keeps pub food prices down
Customer demand for value has forced pub operators to increase food prices by just 2% in the past year.
Meanwhile, the average pint has risen by 7% to £2.58. Those are two findings of the 2009 edition of the Good Pub Guide, released this week, which lists over 5,000 pubs. It predicts a bleak period ahead and urges operators to focus on value and giving customers what they want.
The Guide surveyed the cost food including snacks, starters, mains and deserts at more than 1,000 pubs and found a 2% increase on last year — "far less than the increase in the cost of running the pub and producing that food".
"As we warned last year, customers have started to resist high prices," says the Guide.
"So now, pubcos and individual pub owners facing higher costs are finding it almost impossible to resort to their usual response of simply putting up their own prices.
"It's clear that at last customers are holding pub food prices down successfully by spending on pub meals that they do think worth the money - but not on ones that seem overpriced."
The Guide says the last few months has seen "the first signs of real trouble for some of the country's top food pubs" and the credit crunch and rising costs hit.
"We fear there will be more trouble over this coming year. Even the best pubs in remote areas without local regular support are now at risk.
"The pubs which work hardest and most flexibly to give customers what they want are the pubs which will survive and flourish."
The three favourite pubs meals are steak pie, fish and chips, and steak.
The average price of a dish is now around £11, but there are "striking" variations between regions.
Other highlights
• The Guide urges customers to buy beers from small independent brewers at the pub - and save £18 per year. This amounts to 35p per pint saving on the national average price.
• The typical soft drink now costs £1.80, and the Guide says: "Pubs make no friends by charging so much for drinks that people are used to paying 40p or so in the shops."
• More readers than ever have complained about their pub visits being "spoilt" by badly-behaved children being left unchecked. The Guide says there's "no easy solution".
How beer prices vary
Cheapest (£/pint): West Midlands - 2.25, Notts - 2.33, Lancs - 2.34, Staffs - 2.35, Cheshire - 2.38
Most expensive (£/pint): Surrey - 2.88, London - 2.81, Berks - 2.78, Bucks - 2.76, Suffolk/Warwickshire - 2.72
