Helping on-trade create nights to remember

This Friday (July 10), the Pet Shop Boys will perform at London nightclub Matter and revellers will be able to choose from more than 500 different drinks at an innovative DIY bar based on them selecting their own ingredients.

Of more importance to the pub trade, though, will be goings-on at nine bars also involved in the activity, which is supported by Diageo with the aim of driving footfall into pubs and bars.

The bars have already held nights during which they hosted a touring karaoke booth and were encouraged to offer special drinks or promotions. It is part of Diageo's ongoing 'Smirnoff Original Nights' campaign, which is all about helping the on-trade come up with ways to get the punters in and give them such a good time that they'll come back to that outlet.

Inspiring pubs​

Diageo has operated several events under Smirnoff Original Nights in the past. However, this one is more ambitious, and Diageo hopes it will inspire pubs to greater heights in hosting entertainment.

The only way to attend the Matter event is to submit ideas via social networking website Facebook in exchange for a chance to obtain free tickets. Attendees will vote on which drinks will be served and what the DJs will play.

Inviting customers to vote on what drinks and entertainment you will put on for them is a concept that could work for pub licensees, according to Diageo, especially now when it is more important than ever to attract footfall.

"We are aiming to inspire the on-trade to create great nights for their customers," explains Nick Mills, brand manager for Smirnoff Original Nights. "They could invite locals to suggest ways to change their pub for the night. It helps consumers to feel as if they have more of a relationship with the outlet."

It is also hoped that a number of quirky drinks concepts at Matter could be adopted by pubs to create their own points of interest.

The DIY-style main bar at the nightclubs will offer ingredients the likes of which drinkers won't see every day, and it will be joined by ones where a

cocktail list will be comprised of the four drinks judged as the best posted by users on Facebook.

The drinks offer​

At the nine bars, located throughout London, the drinks were up to the individual operators.

Diageo helped with suggestions and has for some time been running initiatives training barstaff to serve attractive but simple spirit-and-mixer drinks.

The company points to the growing popularity of cocktails and the role they can play when you are running special events. There are plenty of simple cocktails which aren't time-consuming. Often, some vodka, ice and a Schweppes mixer will do the trick.

Mills adds: "Our hope for pubs is that they can use such promotions to drive footfall.

"First of all, this is about getting extra feet through the door. That will drive drinks sales, and vodka and mixer drinks are a particularly profitable category.

"Hopefully, consumers will have a great night and come back to that outlet. Pubs need to create a real point of difference for themselves in order to drive trade these days."

Case study: The Embassy

The Embassy in Islington, London, was one of the bars involved in Diageo's latest round of Smirnoff Original Nights activity.

While the Embassy's assistant manager Donna Jones says the promotion created "extra buzz" among customers, she has reservations about how it was run.

These raise issues about how licensees can perfect an entertainment offering.

Jones says that the karaoke booth arrived around 8pm and left at midnight. This kind of entertainment, she says, would have been more effective later in the evening. The Embassy was open until 2am on the Saturday night of the karaoke booth's residence, and

Jones says customers were only starting to get involved once their evening had reached a certain tempo - just as the booth was closing.

The concept was also not a perfect one for the Embassy's target clientele of over-25s, she says. The promotional staff posted by Diageo outside the venue generally appealed to a younger audience.

In principle, however, Jones believes in the power of hosting entertainment and serving cocktails, both of which the Embassy does on a regular basis.

She says: "You have to be doing some form of entertainment or something like special drinks that sets you aside from the competition, especially in a competitive market like Islington."