How to Attract Customers to Your Pub This Summer

Summer is well and truly in our sights, and many of us have already seen it in with a pint or two in our beer garden of choice. There is something beautiful about that first sunny pint with friends or family, and the beauty doesn’t quite fade with each successive one – all this to say, the summer is extremely lucrative for landlords and pub owners. But customers aren’t so easily won, especially if their prize is a quiet afternoon in a stuffy smoking room. What are some smart ways to bring customers to your premises this summer?

Improve Your Beer Garden 

What is the one thing that everyone and their mother is looking for on a hot Saturday or Sunday afternoon? The answer, invariably, is a pub with a good beer garden. This is a surprisingly difficult task, too – especially in town centres, where good beer gardens are practically non-existent! This is a golden opportunity, then, for your pub to shine. 

If you have a beer garden, now is the time to spruce it up for the summer holidays. Mowing the grass and planting some flowers are obvious options, and absolute musts for creating a welcoming outdoor environment – as is refurbishing or revarnishing your outdoor furniture. A little privacy can go a long way, particularly in suburban or urban areas; erecting some privacy fences around the boundaries of your beer garden, and even between some booths, can work wonders in creating a secret paradise garden that the punters will absolutely love. 

Plan a Season of Events 

Many pubs are perfectly fine as they are, vending drinks and providing comfy places for people to relax. But popular pubs get popular through hosting events. The humble pub quiz is practically a national pastime at this point, and any pub that doesn’t have a weekly one in place is almost actively choosing to make less money. 

But quizzes aren’t quite enough, and especially not in the summer. You have a golden opportunity to put together a summer schedule of events to entice people of all demographics to your premises. Arranging for screenings of summer sporting events like Wimbledon is a no-brainer; speaking of screenings, you could take the alternative route and screen festival footage! If you do want to lean towards music, a temporary events notice could see you putting bands on in your beer garden, bringing life to it on quieter evenings. 

Partner with Other Vendors 

Even outside of specific or ticketed events, you can use collaboration to your favour in drawing more bodies to the pub. For example, if your pub has a kitchen you could arrange for a local street food vendor to take it over for a week or two. This would allow the street food vendor to generate new custom from your regulars, while potentially bringing less-regular customers back to try new menu items. 

Indeed, street food vendors with converted carriages could pitch up in your beer garden or car park on weekends, allowing your kitchen to run alongside theirs and increasing the options available to your customers. This is a fun way to celebrate local business while keeping things exciting on premises, and could also be used to network with numerous other traders in hospitality – particularly if you rotate your vendors week-on-week.