BIG INTERVIEW: Robinsons MD says success is down to great people and continual investing

Oliver Robinson has been joint managing director of Stockport/Bredbury-based Robinsons for about 14 years but began his career “flogging” phones in a move he describes as tough but a great induction into sales.

He moved into recruitment then spent some time working for Adidas before a call from Peter Robinson – then chairman of Robinsons – led to a move into the free trade.

“I took quite a substantial pay cut but it was an opportunity,” Robinson recalls. “I then went into the off-trade before moving to the on-trade where I decided to visit every single one of our pubs – we had more than 400 at the time."

Robinson embarked upon a campaign to improve beer quality across the business’s pub estate.

This has led to annual cellar competitions at its sites, which is something that continues to this day and ensures an excellent drink awaits all customers.

The business still has its head office at the famous Unicorn brewery site in Stockport while most of its brewing and production work takes place in its newer Bredbury home.

Its beers are well known too, including Old Tom Ale, Citra Pale Ale, Robinsons Smooth, Hopnik and Trooper – to mention just a few.

Robinson then got involved in brands and marketing, taking on a more commercial role and went onto the board to become commercial director and, in 2012, became joint managing director with his cousin William.

The number of pubs Robinsons operates has gone down from 400 to about 250 and Robinson admits from all the pubs the group has sold, it has invested “every single penny” back into its estate.

This means Robinsons ploughs about £12m into its pubs through capex, compliance, repairs and so on. Something the brewer and pub operator continues to do annually.

Robinson moves on to say he finds balancing family and work life easy nowadays but stresses that when he started back in 1998, he had to throw everything into his work and it wasn’t until about 2020 when he realised a change was needed.

“I lost my mother in the January, we had to shut all of our pubs in the March, I was diagnosed with cancer in the May and my father died in the August,” he laments. “None of those things were controllable and it was obviously very sad to lose my parents. I was fortunate enough to get my cancer diagnosis really early and I dealt with it very quickly and I’m absolutely fine but it did make me reassess the important things in life.

It’s clear Robinson values interactions with people as a strong part of work and, indeed, of life itself.

“You have to listen to people and give them feedback regardless of what the answer is – that’s key” states Robinson on the qualities a good leader should possess.

“Be known. Make sure people know who you are so get out and about. You also need to be consistent in your attitude. And it’s about how you treat people – to be a great place to work stems from the leaders. Being kind isn’t a sign of weakness.”

Finding the route

Robinson is keen to point point out how great the industry is and that it is important to persuade more young people to go into hospitality as a career.

He says: “It’s more difficult today than it was when I was younger but you can’t do it without a lot of hard work. The key is to have a plan and make sure you’ve got great people around you.

“Without great people, we haven’t got the business that we have now. Every executive member must be better than William and myself. We set the right strategic vision for our business and our shareholders then surround ourselves with brilliant people who can help us deliver it.”

Highlights of his career are more about the way Robinson values success – seeing people ahead of trophies.

He explains: “We haven’t got time to think about highlights in many ways because we live and breathe it so you don’t realise how much you’re evolving.

“The key for me is I’ve got a happy workforce. Happy colleagues across our business is really important and that’s the crux for us.

“When I look back from where we were to where we are today, it’s an amazing achievement. I put in two breweries, one in the middle of Stockport in 2012 and we’ve just put in another brewery [in Bredbury].

“Also, it’s how our teams have evolved and what we’re doing as a business. There’s not one particular event, so we are incredibly proud of everything.”

Conversely, the low points for Robinson, who celebrates his 55^th birthday in early January 2026, are “normally when the Chancellor of the Exchequer stands up because they don’t do a lot to help us”.

He says it’s too easy to stateCovid as a low point in his career to date, but says “that is all a bit of a blur now” but the business did everything it could at the time to support all its partners and our workforce.

“You need to control the controlables,” he says. “The previous Budget meant it would cost us £2m more to run this year than it did last year and at what stage do some of these things become unsustainable? We’re being taxed so heavily and yet our pubs and our pub partners are busy - but can they make money to make a long-term sustainable business?

“We can’t start charging £25 for fish and chips and it’s the same with beer prices as well. We can’t just keep putting our prices up. We’ve got to think slightly differently and do things to continue to attract people into our pubs.”

The most beneficial days

Pressure in the role of joint managing director is something Robinson dismisses, stating he simply “deal with challenges” and says he doesn’t like it when people come to him with problems and would rather they suggest a solution and if it works, he is on board.

Likewise, nothing has necessarily surprised him about being becoming joint managing director.

He reveals: “When you’ve been in the business this long, it becomes part of who and what you are and you evolve into these jobs and roles.”

Finally, when asked if he could start all over again, would he do anything differently, Robinson states: “I wouldn’t. I am who I am. I don’t try to be anything different to that and anything that’s not got quite right I take as a learning and move on.

“It’s the same with our colleagues throughout our business. Could we have done that better? Or we did that really well. What learnings can we take from that to use in other parts of our business?

“I don’t have any regrets because they are a waste of energy. Think about tomorrow rather than yesterday.”