The Brighton bar, which opened in February this year, has positioned itself as a venue focused on women’s sport and more inclusive sports viewing.
Join our new WhatsApp channel: The Morning Round-Up
Get the biggest pub trade stories straight to your phone. Listen to our one-minute daily news briefing and receive breaking news, exclusives and sector updates throughout the day. Remember to turn notifications on in the top right corner!
Join the channel here.
Reward’s data found female customers accounted for 71.4% of spend at the venue from opening until 9 June 2026.
This was 34.8% higher than the average for pubs and bars within a three mile radius, where female customers accounted for 36.7% of spend.
The report benchmarked Crossbar against 604 local pubs and bars, using spending from 669 Crossbar customers and 216,747 competitor customers.
Younger audience
Customers aged 35 to 44 were the venue’s most valuable age group, accounting for 33.8% of spend.
This was 9.4% higher than the local pubs and bars market, where the same age group accounted for 24.4% of spend.
Crossbar also performed ahead of the local market among customers aged 18 to 24 and 25 to 34, suggesting the venue is attracting a younger adult audience.
The data suggests the venue is attracting the audience it was designed to serve, while also creating a broader opportunity around women’s sport viewing.
Repeat visits
The data also showed early signs of repeat custom. While Crossbar has only been trading for a short period, 47.7% of customers had already visited more than once during the period measured.
Customers visiting two to three times a year accounted for 32.7% of its customer base, ahead of the local pubs and bars market average of 28.4%.
The venue also showed strong appeal among customers living between one and three miles away, who accounted for 27.9% of spend, compared with 18.9% across local competitors.
Saturday was the strongest trading day, accounting for 38% of spend at Crossbar, compared with 30.4% across the local pubs and bars market.
The report also looked at where Crossbar customers spent money elsewhere in the local market.
Crossbar accounted for 24.8% of its customers’ spend across their top local venues, equal to around £1 in every £4.
Other Brighton venues appearing prominently in the same customer spend patterns included The Windmill, The Lion & Lobster, The Walrus and The Victory.
The findings come amid wider discussion around the opportunity for pubs and bars to better serve women’s sport audiences, with operators increasingly looking at how venue design, programming and atmosphere can influence who feels welcome in sports led spaces.
