Operators reaping the rewards of football focus, despite Scotland’s absence
SCOTLAND might not have qualified but that hasn’t stopped the trade pulling out all the stops for this summer’s World Cup in Brazil.
From themed food and drink to samba bands and barbecues, operators across Scotland are running a range of activity right through to the final on July 13.
For Lisini Pub Co, whose outlets include Angels in Uddingston and The Parkville in Blantyre, the World Cup is big business.
The group bought two 50 inch outdoor screens, one wall-mounted the other portable, which were installed by SSUK at Angels earlier this month. It has added a World Cup flavour to its drinks range, with ten world beers, including Brahma, Sol, Peroni and Sagres, as well as eight ‘Round the World’ cocktails.
Lisini’s Copa 14 activity got underway with ‘carnival kick-off’ parties featuring samba bands, Brazilian street food, painted models and dancers. Customers received goody bags containing a special brochure highlighting the World Cup fixtures and activity at Lisini’s outlets as well as Lisini Copa 14 t-shirts designed in the colours of one of the three teams the pub group is supporting – Uruguay, Brazil and Honduras.
Beyond screening all the live games throughout the tournament, Lisini is also staging a ladies’ night – The Brazilian – at Angels and The Parkville on July 5, featuring cocktails and live music; and a ‘golden hospitality package’ for the World Cup final on July 13.
Lisini MD Lisa Wishart said the group is already seeing the benefits of its activity, with a 25% increase in turnover in the first four days of the World Cup and a 35% uplift in wet sales on the day of the kick-off event.
“We take the World Cup extremely seriously, despite the fact Scotland do not appear, and work with all our suppliers, including Heineken, Diageo, Belhaven, Red Bull, Maxxium and Rekorderlig, on our Copa 14 activity,” she said.
“The World Cup is the highest-viewed sporting event in the world and we want to ensure that if people want to watch a game, they do it in one of our pubs.”
In Glasgow city centre, sports bar Campus is also said to be benefitting from its World Cup activity.
The Sauchiehall Street venue, which has two projector screens and eight 60 inch screens throughout, is offering a special World Cup menu, World Cup cocktails, Captains’ Cups sharing pitchers and steins of Tennent’s, Foster’s and Heineken. And there are big plans for the final on July 13, which will be themed around the finalists.
Owner Gavin McGreish said business is up by around 30%.
“It’s going really well for us and the timing of the games is almost perfect, even the later games as we have a 3am licence,” he said.
“We’ve also got the advantage of having two floors so we can show the football upstairs and the ground floor can trade as usual or we can have the football on throughout; and we’ve had groups in hiring our large corporate booth to watch the games.
“The final will be a big event and then we’ve got ten days until the Commonwealth Games so we’ll get all the World Cup flags down and put up the Commonwealth flags; we’ve got a lot planned for that too.”
At the Three Sisters in Edinburgh, which has indoor and outdoor screens, the World Cup has also brought a boost to business.
The venue, which has taken on an extra 30 staff for the ‘summer of sport’ leading up to the Festival, is staging Brazilian barbecues as well as offering themed World Cup cocktails.
“We have seen a great increase in trade,” said sales and events manager Sharon Norris.
“We added a couple more screens inside so every inch of the building has a TV up. We don’t do blind spots!”
• What do you have planned for the World Cup final? And what about the Commonwealth Games? Email gillian.mckenzie@peeblesmedia.com.
