Coors sees the light in pub investment

ONE MORE THING: WITH THE FINE weather hopefully upon us and the Euro 2012 just around the corner, beer company Molson Coors …

ONE MORE THING:WITH THE FINE weather hopefully upon us and the Euro 2012 just around the corner, beer company Molson Coors is preparing to invest €150,000 in Irish pubs to help them improve their facilities to attract customers.

“I’d like to see the banking sector do the same thing,” Niall Phelan, country manager for Molson Coors Ireland, told those who attended a launch party late last week in the Cliff Town House on St Stephen’s Green.

The brewer, whose brands also include Grolsh and Carling, conducted some research of Irish pub customers recently, which threw up some interesting answers.

One in three said they would go to the pub more often if there was free Wi-Fi, while 30 per cent want them to provide “better food”.

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One in three want more live music, while 27 per cent want better toilets.

Molson Coors is one of the world’s biggest beer brewers and set up an Irish operation in Dublin and Belfast in January 2010.

It has invested €21 million to date here market and has just launched bottles of Carling Zest into the pub trade here for summertime.

It currently has a 10 per cent share of the Irish lager market.

“We want to double that over the next five years,” Phelan told me.

Ciarán Hancock

Ciarán Hancock

Ciarán Hancock is Business Editor of The Irish Times