Synopsis of The Firkin Saga by David Bruce OBE
David Bruce has enjoyed an astonishingly successful business career from a boarded-up pub in South London to booming pubs and breweries in Britain, the United States and France. Just before David opened the Goose and Firkin a City adviser had told him “This project has absolutely no chance of succeeding, I suggest you abandon it immediately.” David, the serial entrepreneur, proved him wrong in spectacular fashion.
The Firkin Saga is a ripping tale of pubs, beer, brewing, setbacks and success. It tells how one man transformed the simple pleasure of “going for a pint”.
In the 1980s and 90s, David Bruce built a small pub chain, all with Firkin in the name, and, with outrageous puns and good beer, he made pub-going a fun experience.
In 1979 David, whose background was in the hospitality industry, was determined to run his own business. He came across a boarded-up pub, the Duke of York, under a railway bridge in the Elephant & Castle area of south London. The pub was in shocking state of disrepair, with piles of rubble, no lights or heating, and dead rodents in the cellar. But David thought he could clean up the pub, re-open it and, with a stroke of genius, would install a small brewery in the cellar to make his own beer.
With the whole-hearted support of his wife, Louise, David was pitched into protracted negotiation with landlords, local authorities, Health and Safety, the fire department, insurers and bankers. He finally got the go-ahead to lease the pub but only by putting their house up as collateral. If the plans failed, David and Louise would be homeless.
They decided to change the name from the Duke of York to the Goose and Firkin – goose to show the pub had wings and would fly to success while firkin is the industry name for a nine-gallon beer cask. The choice of the name firkin allowed for many tongue-in-cheek and risqué puns to accompany the small chain of pubs that followed the Goose.
The Goose was a success from Day One, with crowds flocking to enjoy such beers as Dogbolter, Earth Stopper, Mindboggler and Knee Trembler. As the Duke of York, the pub had grossed £50,000 a year but by the end of 1979 the Goose enjoyed an annual turnover of £270,000 and, fired with success, David was on the look-out for new pubs to run.
The Fox and Firkin followed in Lewisham and the Frog and Firkin in Notting Hill, followed by an offer to install a pub and brewery in Denmark Hill railway station. The pub would be sited immediately above the train tracks and protracted planning followed to ensure the pub and brewery didn’t collapse on to passing trains. Packed with steam train memorabilia, the Phoenix and Firkin attracted train buffs as well as beer buffs and it also became a watering hole for Terry Jones of Monty Python fame, who lived nearby. The pub also created arguably the most infamous of David’s puns: “Phoenix my Pint, I’ll Firkin Thump Him”.
David opened the Ferret and Firkin in Chelsea and he added the Highbury Brewery Tap in North London that became the Flounder and Firkin – but only after a long battle to remove squatters along with threats from local supporters of the IRA who used the pub for meetings.
1984 was a momentous year for the Bruces as Louise gave birth to Rebecca, the first of two daughters. The family moved out of London to a house on the main road in Hungerford, hoping for a quiet life. That almost ended in 1987 when Louise and Rebecca hid under a table when Michael Ryan went on a rampage with a machine gun. He killed 16 people, including his mother, before shooting himself.
Back in London, more pubs followed: the Falcon and Firkin in Hackney was leased from the Crown Commission, which meant the Queen was David’s landlord. The Phantom and Firkin opened in Plaistow, E14, in 1987, in spite of threats from “the Inter City Firm” of West Ham United fans to torch the place: bullet holes were found in the front door one day. When the pub opened, it was mobbed with enthusiastic supporters who kept the hooligans at bay.
At Christmas 1987, David took the momentous decision to sell the Firkins. He’d not fallen out of love with pubs but had tired of the endless battles with bankers and bureaucracy. The following year, the chain was sold to Midsummer Leisure for £6.6 million in cash.
He put the money to good use. David created two charities, The Bruce Charitable Trust and The Bruce Foundation, to provide respectively canal and motorhome holidays for disabled people. This work was to win David an OBE in the Queen’s Awards.
Far from forsaking pubs and brewing, he threw himself with gusto into the fast-growing craft beer revolution in the United States. He helped start or invested in several breweries, including Brooklyn Brewery in New York City, Wynkoop Brewery in Denver, Brew Moon in Boston and Elysian Brewery in Seattle.
In France, David launched a brew pub The Frog & Rosbif with beers called Inseine and Parislytic that so tickled the fancy of the French that a small chain of Frogs followed. Back home, he was involved with Grosvenor Inns in buying and developing The Slug and Lettuce group of bars before teaming up with fellow entrepreneur Clive Watson to form The Capital Pub Company PLC which was sold in 2011 to Greene King for £93m. Within months of that sale, David and Clive created a further pub company, which became The City Pub Group PLC, which was sold recently to Young’s for £162m..
Images
As well as many photos of David and the Firkins, there is a large batch of hilarious cartoons by Ken Pyne, a regular contributor to Private Eye and other publications.
The USP
The appeal of the book is wide. It will be read by people keen to start and run their own businesses and who will be enlightened in the ways of banks, bureaucratic road blocks and how best to engage in fundraising.
Beer lovers who recall the Firkins will adore the book, as will the real ale lobby of CAMRA with 150,000 members. There will be younger people who didn’t get the chance to visit a Firkin but will know the name.
Readers will not be confined to this country. It should appeal to beer lovers and brewers in the U.S., Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Europe.
Above all, it’s a book that will appeal to people who like a beer, pubs, jokes, puns and a good time. In short, it’s a rollicking good read.
Contact: David Bruce, bru@brewhaha.beer
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