What You Need to Know About Pub Tenancy

28 December 2016
 Categories: , Blog

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Starting a new business, especially if you have never been in one before is challenging. There are a lot of things you will be getting yourself into and if you are not careful, your business may not last. One of the major reasons many people fail in their first business attempts is failing to understand their options from the start. If you want to run a pub, it's very essential that you know all your options because a pub business can be tricky because you can easily lose your customers. There are three major ways you can own a pub: leasehold, freehold, and tenancy. When you are a newbie to the business, you may want to start as a tenant first. Here is all you need to know about pub tenancy.

The Tenancy Agreement

Under a pub tenancy agreement, you will rent the pub for an agreed period from a pub company or brewery that owns it. You can even renew the agreement at the end of this period.

You will pay the rent and manage the activities of the pub including maintenance, staffing, marketing, stock management, accounting, and bookkeeping. However, under pub tenancy agreements, you will enter some sort of beer ties with the pub owners. This means that if the pub is owned by a brewery, you may only sell the types of drinks they brew. On the other hand, if it's owned by a pub company, you may be required to sell drinks only from the company's preferred brewer.

Your Start-Up Costs

Pub tenancy is not like a freehold option where you buy the pub outright so you must cover all costs involved in finding as well as buying it. Pub tenancy usually has smaller start-up costs, which is essential when you are venturing into a business you don't know. While business involves taking risks, you don't want to invest a lot of your money in something you have no experience at all. Pub tenancy gives you the opportunity to gain the experience that you can then use later in your own freehold pub.

Support

As the landlord of the pub, you will be responsible for its success. This is why many pub companies or breweries will offer continued advice and support to their tenants to ensure the business is successful. This means you may be offered training courses in business management and other skills such as marketing expertise, customer service skills, and financial knowledge. They can even give you some business ideas on how to run the pub. All these will come in handy later on when you want to buy your own pub as a freehold owner.