A STAGGERING 27 Waterford pubs have closed over the past two years because of a dramatic change in the public’s socialising habits - and publicans expect more closures across the county over the coming year.
The smoking ban, the clamp-down on drink driving, higher mortgages, the lifestyle change of increased drinking at home and spiralling overheads are among the reasons cited for the economic difficulties facing the county’s pub trade.
Michael Fitzgerald, Secretary of Waterford’s Vintners Federation of Ireland branch said the pub closures have mainly occurred in rural parts of the county where access to taxis and public transport at night is very poor or non-existent
But the pub trade in the county towns and in Waterford city has also been badly hit. Mr Fitzgerald estimated that about five Water-ford City pubs closed in the past year.
“Pubs are quieter than before. Publicans are getting very dependent on the weekends. The midweek trade is quiet every where.
“A lot of them are now closing their premises during the day time, which they didn’t do in the past,” said the co-proprietor of the renowned Munster Bar on Water-ford’s Mall.
Mr Fitzgerald added that some country pubs were now opening just at weekends but he hadn’t heard of any publican doing this in Waterford City.
He was speaking this week from the Vintner’s Federation of Ireland annual conference in Sligo where it was revealed that almost 600 rural pubs have closed across the country since 2003.
In Waterford, the number of pubs has fallen from 213 in 2003 to 186 last year. Mr Fitzgerald said for the first time pubs were now being sold more for the value of the actual property rather than their value as a going concern business.
Mr Fitzgerald estimated that the introduction of the smoking ban in pubs in January 2004 caused a 10 to 15 per cent drop in trade.
“We forecast it would happen but we had people telling us that more people would come to pubs because of the cleaner air. Unfortunately we have been proved right but there is no solace in that.”
However, he acknowledged that there were a variety of other factors contributing to the closures.
“There has been a big change in people’s drinking habits as a result of both the smoking ban and drink driving laws. More people are drinking at home as a result. People also have bigger mortgages and spending more money on holidays rather than going down to the pub.”
The Vintners Federation of Ireland has also cited the increasing overheads burden on publicans as an important factor, particularly the increases in local authority charges for water, waste disposal, which is claims have increased at four times the rate of inflation across the country.
Mr Fitzgerald called on the Government to help publicans by reducing the excise duty on alcohol, which he described as “crazy”. A bottle of spirits cost roughly •11 to buy in Spain but the excise duty and VAT added on in Ireland increased the cost of the bottle by •13, he pointed out.
