To think video may have killed the radio star but the internet killed the pub!

Internet dating must be a factor, too. Nobody goes to pubs looking to pull men / women any more, right?

Yes, that's definitely part of it. There's more options for entertainment in your own home now, as well as communicating with friends from the couch instead of having to actually go out and physically see them. Other stuff too though:

Smoking ban.

Cost of living.

Drink-driving laws.

Increase in prosperity and more comfortable homes. People used to go to the pub to escape slums. Now practically everyone has a home that's watertight and has central heating and a comfortable place to sit and a cooker and a TV and isn't insanely overcrowded, and being in it isn't actively unpleasant.

Men now expected to spend more time with their wife / kids instead of just going to work, considering that they've done their duty to the family and going out boozing.

Greater mobility, for most people. When cars didn't exist or they did exist but only the wealthy could afford them, working class people (certainly in rural areas) lived within walking distance of work and did their socialising likewise. Now more people live in one place, work in another, see family and friends in another, driving between them - the different aspects of life are kept a lot more separate. And people have a lot more options for how they spend their leisure time if they can drive to sporting events / arts events / whatever their personal idea of fun happens to be. I think it's not so much that the internet killed the pub as the car killed the community. It used to be that for a lot of people, the people they worked with were the same people who lived very close by and the same people you hung around with socially and you could walk into the pub without having actually arranged to meet anyone, and there would be people you knew. That's mostly gone now. Your family members and your neighbours and your colleagues and the friends you made in different places at different times of life have quite likely never met each other; everything's just more fragmented.

l moved abroad many years ago but did my teen and 20s drinking in one of the places you mention and the pub culture was great! You wouldn’t have caught me dead in an estate pub, too scary, but The Borough and places like that (The Goat Major, Dempsey’s, The North Star, Pen and Wig) used to be very much my thing! I haven’t been there in many years so I’ve no idea what it’s like now.

Where I live now, the local government has actually just declared a budget deficit due to the massive reduction in alcohol taxes being collected by bars. When I talked to younger colleagues about this, most said they don’t drink at all, preferring gummies (legal here, but not for me!). I still have a glass of wine, a beer or a cocktail but probably once a month rather than once a week like I did in my 30s.

Bars, so I’m told by the born post 1992 crowd, are mostly for going, getting your insta pics with their various feature walls, unique landscaping etc then buggering off 20 minutes later!

Are you the radio star?

@colta
No, you ought to feel bad for the tone of your post. This thread is filled with people who are, or know people who are struggling to make a living. You chose this as a backdrop to your virtue signalling about the effects of alcohol abuse, which no publican would ever want as a consequence of them running a community hub where people can get together and socialise.

I'm thrilled that you're insulated from these market forces, but please spare a thought for those who aren't. Bad form.

And you went out of your way to post something a bit mean just to try and make a stranger feel bad about themselves.

My recently late DH liked our two local Wetherspoons. No music. Cask ale at a reasonable price. I suppose it's where you go to a Wetherspoon, perhaps? The pub I described is not a gastro pub but a real ale pub (tho not a micro brewery). One can always tell. Real ale pubs always have uncomfortable seats for some reason.

Maybe this too, a little.

I can't believe 37% think you're being unreasonable. You're bang on.

Nope the price of drinks killed the pubs.

Depends where you live. All my friends were spread out when I lived in London. I almost never hosted or went to house parties. Always socialised in pubs, bars, cafes, restaurants etc. in Central London, albeit nowhere near as often as I I would have liked (harder to get people out post Covid!)

We're fortunate to have a few that are a bit like that nearby. At least one that I used to dismiss as an old man's pub back in the day (ah, the passage of time!). But we also have plenty of swilling halls, especially on a Friday or Saturday. And I notice that I'm far more selective on my travels these days. It used to be unheard of that I'd visit a town and not get in a few pubs; now I'll look up somewhere suitable before I arrive, and if I don't see anything I'll give it all a miss.

@andyindurham I can meet a friend for a pint, but when we do we want to talk, not scream at each other over the music.

This is a good point and I think is part of the issue. One of the reasons I got tired of pubs was exactly that, all the pubs nearby would ramp up the music at a certain time and take away chairs, all designed of course to make people drink more, talk less and increase profit margins. In doing that they lost the original pub concept of somewhere to meet for a chat, it is after all literally called a public house. I used to love pubs and I think the pub that I enjoyed (much as @Grammarnut described) dug it's own grave in the past 20 years.

My ‘ Gen Z’ does go out for the odd meal or a theme park ! They tend to prefer that to a pub
I lived ‘ down the pub’ in my 20s after work / weekends.
It was a social thing too. Meet up , catch up
They probably don’t need to do that as much these days with the internet : phones.

My DS Gen Z doesn't go to pubs really. He does like going out for food, to clubs and gigs though.

The internet suggests the average cost of a pint of Carlsberg in a pub appears to be about £4.50.

In a supermarket you can get 18x 440 ml cans for £10. That's 13.94 pints or 0.72p per pint.

Approximately 6x more expensive in the pub on average. In the South the figures are probably even worse.

Well, great, that's my type of pub, but it is also the type of pub that is increasingly harder to find.

Sadly.

Ds2 is ‘ Gen Z’ and him and his friends don’t go to pubs as it’s too expensive and Spoons is a bit boring.
They don’t tend to go ‘ clubbing ‘ either. I think it’s sad , but a lot is down to costs really.

@Grammarnut this describes a nice gastropub you would go to ocassionally.

Your average massive spoons with average beers, frozen food and zero entertainment really doesn't fit the bill.

I tend to side with the people talking about living in nicer, warmer homes with more in-house entertainment. I turned 18 in 1994. My first pub trips were when I was living with my parents and wanted space to let off steam with my mates. Then I went to uni, lived in crappy student accommodation and preferred to socialise in pubs and bars because it was nicer than home. Plus, as a student we were well placed to hoover up pound-a-pint nights.

Next came the bedsit / house share years. Again, home wasn't hugely attractive and if I wanted to watch the football, meet friends or try to make new ones, the pub was the place to do it. By 2004, though, I'd bought a place of my own. It wasn't a palace, but it was OK. I could start inviting people over for a meal (or TV and takeaway, depending). If I got lucky, it wasn't embarrassing to go back to mine (indeed, mine was good enough to increase my luck a bit). I still liked pubs, still went out fairly frequently and never had any paid TV sports so I'd go and watch the match. But it was starting to decline. I relocated to work overseas for a time (2006-2015) and went through a similar journey (needed to meet people and build a circle, initially lived in an unattractive flat, so went out; then got established, found a nicer place to live and spent more time at home).

Then came marriage, kids, a realisation that consuming my bodyweight in the most affordable beer available wasn't a great plan. I still go to the pub, but instead of an all-dayer, I'll treat myself to a quiet pint or two after a busy day. Or I'll pop out for a pub lunch while WFH, or go to hear a band that I'm interested in. I tend to favour brewpubs and micros these days rather than swilling halls. I don't need to escape a miserable home. I don't need to strike up chance conversations with randoms (although I do on occasion). I can meet a friend for a pint, but when we do we want to talk, not scream at each other over the music. And we can visit each other's homes, go for a meal / show / gig / whatever. Pubs have changed, but so have I and most of my circle.

True. I was thinking more as: I can invite friends over, put some music on and pour usnsome
wine vs I couldn’t cook some of the food I eat at restaurants. But actually your answer shows that the ‘pub experience’ doesn’t mean the same
thing to everyone / different people will go to
the pub for different things.

My first job, we used to go to the pub for Friday night drinks, colleagues' birthday lunches etc

Now, more people work from home, and we have more pressured fee targets = less likely to go out for lunch. It's just a quick sandwich at your desk

But the pub is the one thing you cannot replicate at home. A diverse group of people. Conversation. Cask ale. Live music on occasion (one place I know has a band every week), quizzes, specialist evenings, (in some cases nice) food. You do not get that combination at home, and though I know pubs which will sell e.g. jars of bags of cask ale, it's not quite the same as the ambience of the pub. I had discussions about bike rides in Ireland, science fiction and fantasy, local wildlife, motorbikes (DS has a Harley), dogs - all on Sunday afternoon, along with cask ale and some acceptable wine (no TV or music in said pub).

I'd say the biggest factor is price. A night out down at the pub used to be most people's idea of a cheap night out. And meeting up in the pub after work - you didn't really think about the cost. But now - £6 a pint in many places, heaven help you if you are with a group of friends and it's your round.

It must be hard for younger people.

We still go, but far less often.

Price is another factor. The cheap pubs are just not that cheap. I don't want to pay a ton of money to sit in a really grimey pub, that is invariably not even heated!, and serves frozen food. It would be fun if it were cheap but it's not. Might as well pay a bit more money for a nice gastro pub every once in a while.

Not acceptable to just spend your evening after work at the pub anymore either.

People don't get "wasted" as often as we used to when we were younger.