Whilst Activity Bars thrive in cities around the country, over 7,000 pubs have closed their doors over the last decade. Three brothers from Northampton want to change this and combine the Activity Bar and the ‘classic pub’ to create their own concept, which focuses on creating extraordinary social experiences with shareable British tapas, unconventional cocktails, social gaming like shuffleboard and skittles and a selection of craft beer – a Social Pub Venue.
The Social Pub Venue concept has attracted a lot of attention over the last three years and the Fitzgerald brothers – Josh, Jack and Ellis – are on a mission to open their first pub in Northampton town centre.
Despite their unwavering belief in the project, finding investors to back their venture has been a daunting task, but that hasn’t stopped them from pursuing their goal with full force.
“The feedback we’re receiving is that as a hospitality start-up and in the current climate, it’s a risky project to take on. National venture capitalists and experts within the sector think it’s too small of a project, whilst more local investors think it’s too big of a project, leaving us in a bit of a pickle,” said Josh.
The brothers have invested £60,000 into the project themselves over the last three years, secured the site and built a social media audience of over 5,000. Their vision is to raise another £350,000, from individual or multiple investors to open their first location in Market Square and then aim to scale up to five sites in over the next five years.
Just recently, they found out they beat 600 other businesses to become one of 150 businesses to be selected to win investment for the project via the Brewdog Unicorn Fund where they will hopefully get to pitch the concept to James Watt, founder of Brewdog in the Waterloo venue then go onto Las Vegas to find out if they one of three winners to be invested in.
If they are unsuccessful, they will be launching their very own crowdfund to raise £100,000 through a Kickstarter campaign, set to launch on the May 16 with the exciting target of raising £100k in 100 hours.
If it goes ahead, the kickstarter campaign will offer fantastic incentives to its backers, from having your name emblazoned on the wall of the venue for life for £20 and paying for a pancake/waffle brunch for two for £35 to some crazier options such as an Extraordinaire Gold Card for £250 which gets you 25% off food, drink and events for 12 months, and hiring the whole venue for a Christmas Party for £5,000.
The brothers recently returned from a 72-hour ‘InvesTOUR’ of the UK, where they visited nine cities, from London to Edinburgh on the hunt for an investor for the project and to speak to potential customers about what their dream pub would be.
Josh Fitzgerald said:
“The Kickstarter campaign will help us lower investors’ risk by a third, making it a more attractive proposition. On top of that, we’re SEIS/EIS assured which means there are certain tax incentives for investors that want to join us in creating a nationally scalable Social Pub Venue concept.”
Visit www.brotherspub.co to learn more about becoming an investor or about the Kickstarter campaign which is set to go live on Tuesday May 16 at 9am
