Marston's (MARS)

[monabri]

A couple of articles on MARS.

From the Daily Mail

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/mark ... -pubs.html

From the FT (doesn't seem to be behind a paywall...?)

https://www.ft.com/content/29e87918-794 ... daf11b720d

[tjh290633]

It is.

TJH

[tjh290633]

Moderator Message:
It is not good practice to post links without some indication of context.

In the case of the FT article, I get "subscribe to read" in big letters, below a title that tells me nothing.

TJH

[Breelander]

Moderator Message:
It is not good practice to post links without some indication of context.

In the case of the FT article, I get "subscribe to read" in big letters, below a title that tells me nothing.

TJH

Actually you get...
Subscribe to the FT to read: Financial Times "UK pub chain Marston’s agrees 5 year deal with American craft brewery"
...which at least gets the title so you can Google (and thereby read) it. Better to just give the title for FT though, then we can go straight to Google.

[Thriddle]

here's the press release on Marston's own website:
http://www.marstons.co.uk/news/marstons ... nders.aspx

[monabri]

Here's an overview of the articles.

From the D.Mail
Marston’s bought brewery company Charles Wells last year and the purchase has given them the distribution rights for Founders Brewing “All Day IPA” – a craft beer.The Founders brewing company is based in Michigan. The deal is for 5 years.

From the FT.
The FT reports on an agreed a five-year distribution deal with American craft brewery Founders Brewing Company “in a move to tap into the growing popularity of inderpendent beers in the UK”
Marstons indicated that over the past year, UK sales of Founders’ All Day IPA had increased by 274 per cent, both across its 400 pubs and in supermarkets (no figures to say what this increase means in terms of volume!).
Marstons also states that they are working with “numerous” (no number specified) other independent operators, craft beer bars and the likes of Young’s, Castle Pub Company and Morrison’s to name just a few.


(Just Google 'Marstons and FT' to find the article in full without paywall)

[JMN2]

Founders' beers are very nice old-fashioned hoppy ipa's ie no new world mango papaya NEIPA tropical fruit cloudiness but instead some hoppy pine resin bitterness.

Marston's will remain on my naughty step regardless.

[PinkDalek]

… (Just Google 'Marstons and FT' to find the article in full without paywall)

If only life were so simple. Bree's "UK pub chain Marston’s agrees 5 year deal with American craft brewery" takes fewer clicks.

Any mention anywhere of the Carbon Dioxide shortage, in so far as this is concerned?

[daveh]

What about them stocking some of the great local craft beers - they could even tailor it to locality ie stocking beers from Windswept (small Lossiemouth craft brewer) in NE Scotland or the Abbey brewery In North Yorkshire. No need to go all the way to the USA for craft beers.

[monabri]

And now that Germany have been turfed out of the World Cup, I can see many a pint of Marstons (and Greene King) being raised in celebration....

Not HYP but I don't care !!!

[tjh290633]

Not to mention Banks's, Ringwood 49, Hobgoblin, Speckled Hen and even IPA.

Support your local brewery.

TJH

[Bouleversee]

I'm taking some friends to a local Marston's restaurant for dinner on Friday, using a shareholder's voucher for the first time. It had better be good. How much difference do you suppose the recent brewery purchase will make to Marston's profits? It would be nice to see them get back to my purchase price before I pop my clogs. If they don't run out of CO2 the current weather should be helping the takings.

[tjh290633]

Lorna, my only experience of a Marston's pub was using Banks's Blue Brick Tap House in Brierley Hill, where I enoyed Mrs Baggott's Faggots and Chips, with onion gravy, for something like £2.99 in the 1990s.

TJH

[Bouleversee]

Oh dear, that doesn't sound quite my style, Terry. Not quite the thing for this weather, either. Perhaps I'd better whiz down there and scrutinise the menu tomorrow. What made me think you were a regular? Perhaps just your love of the shares!

[Gengulphus]

Perhaps I'd better whiz down there and scrutinise the menu tomorrow.

Probably no need to do the whizzing - it's likely that you can find its website and view its menu from http://www.marstons.co.uk/pubs/. Not a regular either, by the way - I've got Greene King in my HYP rather than Marston's, and I live in Cambridge, which is much more Greene King 'territory' than Marston's...

Gengulphus

[Bouleversee]

Thanks, Geng. As it happens, I did exactly that yesterday evening. I didn't get as far as menus, however, as I saw the Trip Adviser sign and looked at the recent reviews, which were awful, especially as regards service, so I have cancelled the reservation and plan to go to another one in the area which had excellent reviews. The management of the Marston's one have promised to improve things but I think that will take some time. Let's hope it's an exception in the Marston's pub restaurants.

[tjh290633]

Lorna, we don't have any Marston's pubs nearby. My experience dates back to working in the Black Country in the 1990s. A pub that I go to occasionally stocks their beers, but is a free house. I do find that Trip Advisor tends to collect disgruntled customers, but first hand knowledge is the only real test.

Hope that you have a nice meal.

TJH

[monabri]

I'm surprised that there hasn't been fall out from Greene King's results (down over 10% at the moment).

[Bouleversee]

TJH -

The reviews on the same page for other nearby restaurants were very much better but I suppose there could be vested interests at work. Nevertheless, I think I will try it on my own a bit later on when they have had a chance to improve service before inviting guests and if it's still not up to scratch speak to management rather than Tripadviser..

[Gengulphus]

I'm surprised that there hasn't been fall out from Greene King's results (down over 10% at the moment).

Well, we had Marston's results to the end of March about 6 weeks ago, without any particular fallout for Greene King (it was down a couple of percent on the day, but that's within the range of normal daily price fluctuations, and it was well up within the next week). And Greene King's results are to near the end of April, so only about one extra month's worth of trading conditions in the pub business affect them, and they are a bit more upbeat about recent trading conditions. So it might well be that Marston's shareholders are tending to think that the market has been over-optimistic about Greene King's prospects and is merely coming down to earth, or that Greene King are telling them the bad news they already knew and the good news they didn't...

But really, I don't think this sort of stuff is particularly relevant to LTBH investing. It can be of academic interest to speculate about what's going on in the market's head (if it can be said to have one!), and I've been known to do so for that reason (as I am doing above) and also occasionally when trying a trading strategy (with very mixed success!). But IMHO, trading strategies and HYP strategies don't mix at all well: one needs completely different mindsets to run them, as well as completely different amounts of time available to track what's going on in the market.

Gengulphus