• The company plans to create over 1,000 new jobs through the cash injection into its Star Pubs & Bars chain.
• The UK pub industry has experienced significant closures due to cost-of-living pressures and the Covid pandemic.
• Star plans to renovate over 600 pubs, a quarter of the 2,400-strong chain.

Brewing giant Heineken announced plans to reopen 62 pubs that it had closed in recent years and to invest £39 million in refurbishing hundreds of sites across the UK.

The company stated that the cash injection into its Star Pubs & Bars chain would result in the creation of more than 1,000 new jobs.

The UK pub industry has suffered significant closures, both during the Covid pandemic and afterward, as cost-of-living pressures have impacted consumer spending.

Between 2021 and 2023, pubs shut at a rate of 500 a year, as reported by the British Beer and Pub Association (BBPA).

Star plans to renovate more than 600 pubs, approximately a quarter of the 2,400-strong chain. It has selected locations that it says reflect how many of its customers have reduced the frequency of commuting into city centers.

Heineken said: “With working from home more commonplace and people looking to save on travel, major refurbishments will concentrate on transforming tired pubs in suburban areas into premium locals.”

The company announced that by the end of this year, the UK operation would have reopened 156 pubs since the start of 2023, “reducing the number of closed pubs in its estate to pre-pandemic levels.”

During Covid, authorities forced pubs to close to prevent the spread of the virus. Upon reopening, they encountered a series of restrictions, including mandatory table service, limits on group sizes, and a 10 pm curfew.

In early 2021, Heineken announced plans to cut 8,000 jobs globally. The following year, it issued a warning about inflation, particularly on commodities such as barley and aluminum, stating that it was “off the charts.”

This occurred before Russia invaded Ukraine in late February 2022, which subsequently raised the cost of energy, fuel, and grains.

According to the Office for National Statistics, the average price of a pint of draught lager reached £4.71 in March, compared to £3.76 in February 2020 before widespread pandemic lockdowns the following month.

Meanwhile, data from the BBPA shows that the number of pubs in the UK fell from 47,200 in 2019, before Covid, to 45,350 in 2023. However, pub numbers have been declining for some time. A decade ago, there were 52,500 in operation, which is 7,150 more than in 2023.

Some of the pubs that Heineken is reopening have been shut for more than four years, while others have been closed for 12 months.

The Ship in Worsbrough, Barnsley, closed its doors four-and-a-half years ago and remained dormant until Heineken refurbished it for £370,000. It reopened in February 2024.

The Ashford Arms in Derbyshire, described by Star Pubs as “a Covid casualty,” was closed in March 2020 but reopened after a joint £1.6 million refurbishment by Heineken and Longbow Venues, an independent hospitality business in the Peak District.

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