Closing time comes calling for rural pubs
Almost a quarter of Galway’s pubs have closed in the past two decades, a new report from the drinks industry has confirmed.
The research commissioned by Drinks Industry Group of Ireland (DIGI) showed 129 pubs have shut for good in Galway since 2005 – including five last year.
That represents a 22.5% reduction in the number of public houses in Galway in two decades. The report, compiled by economist and associate professor emeritus at DCU, Anthony Foley, showed that nationally an average of 112 pubs stopped trading every year, with a further 600 to 1,000 closures estimated over the next decade.
Joe Sheridan, chair of the Galway City and County Vintners Federation of Ireland told the Connacht Tribune the report confirmed an “acceleration of the demise of the rural Irish pub”.
“I suspect there are hard days ahead for small businesses but there are harder days ahead for a lot or rural publicans, who are multi-generational businesses. Once they close, they stay closed,” he said.
Mr Sheridan is proprietor of Sheridan’s of Milltown, a gastropub, and Tigh Breathnach, an old-style pub in Dunmore.
He said two-thirds of the money that passes over the counter was “direct or indirect taxation”.
Caption: VFI leader Joe Sheridan.
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