Pub Bitch: Mint club flirts with ASA, Dusanj bros, Ronnie O'Sullivan, and the big breakfast mystery
Classy establishment
Walking the 'decency tightrope' can prove a little difficult with advertisements. But sometimes there's just no excuse. Leeds nightclub Mint has landed itself in hot water after holding an event called 'Filth' - which, charmingly, guaranteed half-price entry to the first 50 "sluts" through the door. Flyers for the evening's festivities featured naked women with sex toys. Tut tut. Unsurprisingly the Advertising Standards Authority has stepped in to ban flyers for the event, saying they breached decency rules. One question sprang gazelle-like to mind though: exactly who was judging the veracity of anyone entering claiming to be a "slut"? Just a thought…
The brothers are back
Seems like those Dusanj brothers are ready to come in from the cold - literally - at last. After lying low for more than 18 months since Cains, their Liverpool brewery and pub operation, went into administration with debts of around £35m, the pair popped up on the telly last week. The BBC sent a film crew to capture them turning off the brewery's gas supply to save energy. As well as some nice footage of this earth-shattering event the team from the Beeb even prised some advice on how the industry needs to change to survive in 2010 from the boys, who bought Cains back from the administrators in 2008. Guess there's nothing like the voice of experience…
Ronnie's big break
Whitbread announced last week its Premier Inn hotel arm would be offering a free night at one of its establishments to the first 147 people to email the company after snooker star Ronnie O'Sullivan scores a perfect 147 break, should he manage such a feat at the forthcoming Masters Snooker tournament. Whitbread stressed this offer would only be up for grabs once, so if the 'Rocket' does it twice, so to speak, there'll be no more rooms 'gratis'. Given O'Sullivan's reputation for enjoying himself into the early hours, if he gets a 147 break the lucky winners will be hoping he's not staying in their Premier Inn…
Behind the numbers
Christmas trading figures were all the rage last week, or not, depending on whom one spoke to. Yates's operator Town & City Pub Company revealed decent enough numbers for the festive period, as well as noting some 2009 highlights: an impressive £105k raised for Help for Heroes; 796,230 burgers sold; 352,051 £1.99 meal deals cooked; 427,349 pints of Bombardier poured and a 479 per cent increase in breakfast sales. Given its enthusiasm for detail on the charity raising, the burger selling, the meal deal cooking and the pint pouring, Pub Bitch wondered of T&C what the breakfast sales percentage hike actually meant. "The company isn't giving out those details," said a spokesperson. "It's in the thousands though." OK, we believe you…
Kiss and make up
The BIS committee investigating the pub industry isn't a big fan of Brulines, the beer monitoring lot, and the feeling was mutual after the BEC report effectively condemned the company's technology. Whereupon Brulines' CEO James Dickson got a bit hot under the collar and talk of legal action followed. However Dickson recognised he might have gone a bit too far; I understand he has written to BIS committee chairman Peter Luff to set records straight and re-establish cordial relations between his company and committee MPs. Luff would only confirm he was "encouraged by the tone of recent correspondence with Mr Dickson", but declined to elaborate.
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