Niall Duff, EVG:THE 21ST century hasn't been kind to the traditional Irish pub. With as many as 1,000 pubs outside Dublin having closed in recent years - and up to 600 nationwide in the last year alone - the industry has had to take a long hard look at the way it was doing business in order to survive.

"By 2000, the pub industry had millennium malaise," says Niall Duff, one half of the duo behind EVG, a boutique business that started life solving pub problems through market research, reinvigorating trade according to demand and recruiting the right people to work the bar.

Duff, the managing director, first met development director Keith Williams at a gig in Johnny Fox's in 2001. The two were kindred spirits, had complementary skills and experience and decided to work together, forming the business the same year.

Duff had cut his teeth as manager of the Burlington Hotel. After managing several pubs in London, he had returned home in 1989 to turn around Johnny Fox's - at the time an ailing landmark location in the Dublin mountains. In his five years there, he transformed it into one of the the top five bars in the State in terms of turnover. "The secret to future-proofing its success was adding food to the mix and changing their profit weightings," Duff explains.

Under Duff's guidance, profits at Johnny Fox's increased by 90 per cent. "Toasted sandwiches don't cut it any more," says Duff. "I dramatically changed the split between food and drink, moving the ratio from a 70 per cent beverage and 30 per cent food to a split that saw food take 65 per cent."

Keith had founded the Heineken Green Energy festival and had tour-managed Kildare singer Jack L. Previously he had been involved with Green Grass management, a Temple Lane Studios sister company that sourced publishing deals for profile Irish bands in North America and he had also helped transform Temple Lane Studios into what then became the Temple Bar Music Centre.

Duff had been responsible for the Guinness Island development in Germany, which quickly became the highest turnover pub on mainland Europe and was then recruited by the Quinn Group in 1997 as a hotel general manager, and trouble-shooter for other operations within the group.

The EVG business model was originally built around the idea of transformation of existing licensed premises. The company now mainly operates in the new-build bar business. The North's economy is now booming and that is where most of its efforts are concentrated. Business has grown through word-of-mouth recommendations.

Five years ago the partnership put their money where their mouths were and went into the boutique hotel and bar business for themselves, opening the 12th Lock, in Castleknock, in 2003. "We needed an operation that was a shop window," explains Duff. "There was no point in putting yourself as a consultant without a case study to illustrate what was possible."

The whole policy was to introduce all-day trade, says Duff, rather than a rush at lunchtime only - to get customers to linger. At the 12th Lock, they were early adapters of free Wi-Fi and also opened their doors for breakfast at 7.30am.

The idea was old-fashioned hostelry values with a new slick interior, explains the managing director. "It's a bar with a restaurant attitude without a restaurant feel. Distinguishing that difference is very important," continues Duff. "It's a fast and lighter offer."

Simple food is what sells. The home-made burger is their biggest-moving dish. They also do other staples such as Thai curry, fresh fish and salads. "The impact was massive," Duff says. "We really upsold international beers as well as wine. Ireland has come a long way in wine sales. They're very important in a pub, taking up 12 to 14 per cent of our wet sales, which is huge compared to five years ago when it was only two to four per cent."

The introduction of food was a question of survival of the fittest. "Drink-driving wiped out the Monday to Thursday drink trade," Duff explains. "The smoking ban then fuelled a food attitude in a clean environment."

The secret to sustained profitability, he adds, was to build a high turnover with food from Monday to Thursday rather than depending on the latter half of Friday and Saturday night.

The business has gone from a year one turnover of IR£69,000 approximately in 2001, to a turnover in the region of €4 million.

"With three new operations opening this year we're potentially increasing our turnover by another €7 million," says Duff.