The Sun and Doves....comments

[FatherJack]

Bloody hell all this AND secondary school transfer!!

Ah the Sun and Doves, I have many good memories from back in the day

and thanks to this thread I'm going to re-visit....thank you for reminding me

of it's existence!

[Tarot]

Is this the public stocks thread.

A few rotten apples sorted out, and teamwork-all sorted.

[citizenED]

I have to admit that I don't like threads starting like this. If you have a bad experience at a local business, why not just come on here and ask other people's opinion of the business. That would be a much better way of working out whether the business is as bad as you think, or whether you were just unlucky on your visit. As it stands we have a thread title that accuses this business of being poor then we have various responses, mainly positive until the proprieter came back with his extensive response. On balance it looks like the pub is far from being "one to avoid".

[Huguenot]

I too think the OP's response to Mark sounds spiteful and churlish. If you're offered an olive branch one should accept gracefully rather than try to rub someone's nose in the muck.

[tllm2]

Each to their own and all that ..........

[Huguenot]

Which only goes to reinforce my point tllm2. Now I'm beginning to doubt your motives.

[derbyean]

You are not alone Huguenot,

he has been offered a free meal to make up for the first one, what more can proprietor Mark Dodds do, what more can you expect tllm2?

It seems to me there is more to this than meets the eye,

otherwise you would do as Mick Mack has already suggested and accept it with good grace,

and stop being an ungracious toad.

[Mark Dodds]

I didn't come back to this because I've been busy...

The Sun and Dove is shut now forever as the pub I operated for sixteen years. I was served eviction papers by Scottish & Newcastle Pub Company for 23 September 2 days short of 16 years since the day I signed the lease in 1995.

The rent and beer prices were so high the business barely made any money. Which is a contributing factor to all problems the business experienced - right down to shaky service at times. If you can't invest in a premises it makes it harder to keep customers, harder to keep staff interested and tends to lead to a cruel downward spiral of disrepair and neglect.

If you're interested in why so many pubs are closing all over the UK it's because of the beer tie.

I've got a blog here http://anotherdayanotherdollar.blogspot.com/?zx=12aa159d191fe7f9 which has a lot of stories and thoughts about it all but is not a timeline that's easy to read through.

The Morning Advertiser, the publicans' publican's newspaper has an article about it: http://bit.ly/nNANtb

The years of being in a pressure cooker made me have a nervous breakdown in 2007 - which you may understand to some extent affected normal service at the Sun and Doves for a whole couple of years - I was suicidal for a while. It was a grim period. But during my recovery and since I vowed to do something about this inequity and gathered together a bunch of other tied lessees and set up The Fair Pint Campaign www.fairpint.org.uk which has lobbied government for the end of the beer tie and has presented evidence about the pubcos to three Business, Innovation and Skills Select Committees who subsequently have recommended that pubcos be legislated against.

IN the last two years I've been working on the foundations for The People's Pub Partnership: http://bit.ly/qpe85z

It's going to take a couple of months for me to gather my things (I have nowhere to live at the moment) but PPP WILL happen. If you're interested to know more please do send a note to [email protected] with KEEP ME UP TO DATE in the subject - THANKS

[mockney piers]

Mark, I understood things weren't going well there, but it's a real shame to hear it's over and the toll it's taken.

I'll happily get you a pint if you need someone to sound off at, and hope to see you round and bouncing back soon.

All the best

Piers

[Mark Dodds]

I'd like that Mockney Piers, thanks, when the dust's settled eh?

[Dopamine1979]

Very sad to hear that. I used to work at King's and we would all meet there every Friday evening. End of an era.

[RosieH]

Yes, it's a very sad day. Of late I didn't get down to the Sun and Doves nearly as much as I used to: moving from Camberwell to ED, it stopped being so local. But I have many, many glorious memories of the place: barbecues and broken hearts and making friends and and showing off. It took me from university to impending middle age, not least a spectacular birthday party this June at Magnificent 7s.

Gutted that it's going, but Mark, I applaud your efforts on PPP and would be very interested to hear more about it. I once worked on a campaign about putting pubs back at the heart of the community, but it quickly became apparent that the brand I was working for couldn't give a flying f*ck, and it was all about increasing beer sales.

It would be good to see something positive come out of your awful experience. Best of luck, and keep us posted.

[ibilly99]

Had some great times there in the past and your blog was a revealing and heart felt read - money and the looting bankers are all that seems to matter these days one day folk will wake up and realise that we have all been shafted like you Mark.

Occupy Wall; Street