Since opening in 2019, Liverpool Arts Bar has had to overcome significant challenges.
Found on Hope Street in Liverpool city centre, the bar was devised as a space to promote the city's grassroots art scene, as well as being a relaxed and inviting location to drink. Established by a group of creatives, it boasts an offering of "live music, great cocktails and local ales".
However, in the three years since the bar opened, the hospitality industry has been hit with devastating existential threats. The first major hurdle came less than a year after Liverpool Arts Bar poured its first beer - when the Covid-19 pandemic hit in spring 2020.
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Ben Cosgrove - one of the bar's directors - said that the pandemic inflicted a double blow on the fledgling organisation. He told the ECHO : " We got hit twice - hospitality was the first thing to shut and then the last thing to open. But then artists didn’t have any money, so we were without any support whatsoever".
The bar had to improvise and looked for several new revenue streams, including a range of merchandise, running a podcast and recording socially-distanced live sessions. It was able to struggle through the lockdowns and found itself in a position to expand afterwards.
Then, the latest grave threat to the hospitality industry arrived hot on the heels of lockdowns. Ben told the ECHO that inflation and the cost of living crisis has presented a myriad of financial obstacles for the bar - chiefly a hike in the price of supplies, a lack of disposable income among customers and a need to increase wages for performers and staff.
He said: "We had to make sure that wages are fair. We’re quite a community-based business.
"At the very least, we pay everyone the national living wage - no matter what their age is, because everyone’s doing the same job at the end of the day, so we need to make sure that there’s a base level of fairness. From a strategic standpoint, it would make more sense to just get a load of 'barbacks' in, but it’s not the way that we’ve ever worked. It’s a big thing for us to get adjusted to."
Wages are just one of the higher operating costs that the bar has had to absorb. The price of importing stock has also increased and Ben said that the bar had noticed this before April's hike in energy prices - he cited the Russian invasion of Ukraine and Brexit as factors which have sent costs spiralling.
He said: " Supply was - from what we can understand - mainly affected by Brexit. We got hit because we have a couple of international lagers and importing that was getting held up and then the price increase came from there.
"But also, one of our big suppliers is Camden and they actually store beer in rubber barrels - materials for them come from Ukraine. Suddenly they had no barrels, so it just means that you’re relying on more expensive products".
He continued: "Long before the energy crisis, these are things that have been going on for a while now. In terms of pricing, they (suppliers) used to do a big price hike at the start of April every year and that’s when new prices would kick in.
"We noticed they’re now doing two or three a year. Instead of putting prices up every year, the minimum we’ve got to do is how many times our base price changes.
"We’re hoping we can get away with two new prices each year. Although we’re a city centre bar, we really try to keep the cost of everything down - people do have less money in their pockets now."
Making sure that the bar remains accessible for all punters is key for Ben and the bar's other directors. They host an event every night of the week - often live music - and all are free.
Ben wants to provide a platform for as many emerging artists as possible as well as offering a packed (and affordable) event schedule for customers.
He explained: " Hopefully if you keep costs down to a minimum, people will still come out, because their appetite for entertainment won’t change". However, he said: " If it’s £15 to £20 a ticket for a band that aren’t even signed to a record label, nobody’s going to take that risk, especially now."
Though he is conscious of the fact that customers have less money to spend on socialising, Ben hopes that the Arts Bar will continue to attract people through its doors. However, he said that the current crisis and the fact that people are going out makes the landscape even more competitive.
He said: "If people come out, but they’re only going to one thing a week, we’ve got to make sure it’s our thing." Despite that, he thinks that people will want to support institutions like his during this time and the attraction of going out for a drink and socialising will not wane.
He said: "Even now, i f you find yourself with a tenner, you’re going to go for a beer, aren’t you? What else are you going to do with that money? You might as well be out - with the lights off at home - and have a beer." He added: " I think that defiant attitude in the face of problems is massively Liverpudlian - that’s very true to people who live here."
Despite the number of difficulties that the cost of living crisis has presented, Ben remains committed to delivering what the bar promised when it opened - a platform for live musicians and an affordable destination in which to spend an evening.
He said: "As horrendous as we all find it as business owners and with profit going down to a bare minimum, we’re actually more than just a bar. We’re community based with grassroot musicians and we’re all artists ourselves. But we want to make sure that the arts don’t suffer like they did during the pandemic."
He continued: " It’s really hard balancing it all, but if we can support grassroots musicians and support artists, then we’re doing something right. It’s difficult for everyone but we’re lucky in that we’ve built something that is accessible to everyone."
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