Young’s brewing again!
To celebrate their 194th anniversary, Young’s decided to bring back Waggledance, the 4% ABV honey flavoured beer that they acquired from Vaux some years ago. The significant point here is that it was brewed in-house at the King Street Brew House in Bristol. This site was included in the deal when Young’s acquired the City Pub Company. Young’s have allowed the very popular brewpub, which opened in 2016, to continue trading as before. The beer, which used honey from the White Bear in Kennington, was available for a limited period in cask at selected pubs, including the Spread Eagle in Wandsworth and the White Bear itself.
Meanwhile Winter Warmer has made its welcome annual return. It had previously been brewed at the former Banks’s Brewery in Wolverhampton but, following Carlsberg Britvic’s recent closure of that site, it is presumably now brewed at the former Marston’s brewery in Burton-on-Trent.
Young’s reported that, for the 52 weeks ended 31 March 2025, like-for-like revenue grew by 5.7%. Over the last Christmas period, the Guinea Grill in Mayfair took over £300,000 in one week.
Wetherspoons news
There are 278 Wetherspoon pubs included in the Good Beer Guide 2026.
JDW’s policy of ‘churning’ pubs continues. The latest closure is the Baxter’s Court in Mare Street, Hackney. It is expected, as with most of JDW’s disposals, that it will reopen as a pub under new ownership. Over in Croydon, JDW have acquired a historic former Beefeater, the Coombe Lodge. See the Pub News column for further information.
The first of fifteen planned Wetherspoons franchises has opened but none are in London and so it isn’t known how they differ, if at all, from the original concept.
Greene King invests in London
GK report that, in the course of 2025 to date, they have invested over £6 million in fourteen of their London pubs. They spent £1 million on the Railway at Liverpool Street and saw an increase in trade of 113% as a result. Something similar happened at the City of Quebec in Marylebone, regarded as London’s oldest LGBTQIA+ venue. GK are planning to refurbish a further five pubs before Christmas, starting with the Two Brewers in Covent Garden, which should already have reopened by the time you read this. GK have 166 pubs in Greater London out of an estate of 1,600.
Greene King’s chief executive, Nick Mackenzie, made some interesting comments to the Propel newsletter recently. He believes that the main competition for pubs now comes from cafes and food delivery ‘apps’ such as Deliveroo providing take-aways and that there are now other businesses fighting for consumers’ money as a growing share of the population is not drinking alcohol.
Morgans expand
The Morgan Pub Collective has acquired the Jolly Fine Pub Group. This has added the Victoria in East Sheen and the Fox & Grapes on Wimbledon Common to their estate.
Following the Lady
Following the great success of their venture, the Devonshire, in Soho, the three partners are opening a second venue, this time in Covent Garden. The site in question is the former offices of The Lady magazine, which retired to the country in 2019. The large six-storey Georgian building in Bedford Street is, somewhat surprisingly, not listed. Westminster City Council approved the premises licence application in October. There will be a pub on the ground floor with various restaurants on the upper floors, very much in the style of the Devonshire. The new venture, possibly called the Lady, is not expected to open until early 2027.
Readers may recall that, in 2023, JD Wetherspoons acquired a former TGI Friday site further along Bedford Street. Their application was refused.
Laines outsources their brewing
Brighton based Laines, a subsidiary of the Punch Pub Company, has ceased brewing in order to concentrate on its pubs. Instead, it has concluded an arrangement with the Keystone Brewing Group under which Keystone will produce and distribute Laine’s beers. Keystone’s portfolio includes the Black Sheep and Purity breweries. Laine run a number of former Young’s tenanted pubs on behalf of Punch following their purchase of the Ram Pub Company.
More Stonegate pubs for sale
Following the package that they put on the market in March, Stonegate, the UK’s largest pub company, is offering a further 23 pubs for sale, either individually or in small lots. These are all free-of-tie pubs let on long leases, so this is an investment and the new owners will not have immediate access to the pubs for their own use. It is expected that the sale will bring in around £22 million. The pubs are spread out across the country, with five of them in London.
Ringwood Brewery site sold
A curiosity worth reporting, I thought. As seemed inevitable, Carlsberg Britvic have sold the site of the former Ringwood Brewery in the New Forest, closed at the beginning of last year, to a housing developer. It has not however been sold for redevelopment. The buyers intend converting the site into offices for themselves. There will also be some spare space available to let to another company, so that at least they will be bringing some jobs to the town. I expect that the sale price was somewhat more that the £19.2 million that CB paid for the business in 2007.