Salutations comrades, and all those beer-bashing and lager-loving punters out there (mainly British, but Sam's also ships to the US so also for our American ale enthusiasts)
Was off the cuff informed Reddit might be a sound platform for airing overdue laundry, amongst others. I worked in a Samuel Smiths brewery as a neat way into the glorious Big Smoke itself. London bound, fleet footed and brim with aspiration, who could resist that sweet £62.5 for accommodation in the beating heart of the capital? Well, the spirit survives, but its now wiser: that was a trap.
The problem isn't the other live ins or even the managers: I moved into a small pub in Fitzrovia, living with the manager and another fella, and we became close friends immediately. The problem herein lies in Samuel Smith's exploitative tactics to squeeze out maximum profit for minimum expenditure, at the cost of everything else. £9.50 in london not only defies the London minimum living wage but its also the lowest paid pub job in capital, bar none. The salary for a manager is laughably low too, and often the bar staff still earn more per hour than the managers for the amount of work needed. And, comrades, is the work arduous.
Samuel Smith brewery is, as far as I can tell, the only Company that doesn't hire cleaners in the country. Thus, it falls on the bar staff to maintain the entire pub, and that includes everything (fire places in winter): scrubbing the literal crap in loos, mopping and hoovering, cleaning brass, handling an insane amount of toxins, loads of insane heavy lifting to name but slice of this alcoholic pie. With Brexit and the lack of foreign workers (Sam Smith relied on an influx of Ozzies, Kiwis and fellas from SA, enticing them over with the live in deal, which is a sweet deal), the company is chronically understaffed across the board. Thus, everyone has to fight their case well not to work 60+ hrs a week, which isn't much if it weren't for the grueling nature of it. Crucially, a lot of the time there's never any proper staff training as there's frankly no time for the managers to do this, thus health and safety standards are regularly dubious if not outright failing. There's also no security, which considering most of the pubs are in zone 1 hot spots, it makes for hairy moments with no support from the company. And to top it all off, none of the bar staff are actually on fixed term contracts, all being on probation period of 6 months, knowing full well that none of them last that long, and giving them free reign to fire anyone willy nilly, without hesitation nor consequence. Which brings me more so to the beaurocracy
Samuel Smiths is an inheritance really, being independently run by the Smith family for over a century. Not going into ad hominen slander on the men, I'll keep it tk the logistics. Every partner they work with is either owned by outright or majority-share owned by Samuel Smith, so really there are no independant adjudicators or support. Which means in short they can reap maximum rewards and do as they please, budgeting obscenely. The cleaning budget they gave one of my managers per month was £60. £60, to clean the entire pub, once every month. They never fork out to repair their pubs properly, instead opting for tightening budgets by dropping something: hours for workers, or increase the price of their alcohol. For instance, when finally implored to pay for their own fruit (rather than have their managers buy it!) They decided to increase all spirit prices by at least £1. When we needed an actual functioning hoover for our pub, our area manager decided he'd only fork out for one if he'd take a portion off our cleaning budget for the next 5 months. Samuel Smith used to prize itself on its cheap, sophisticated beers and traditional pubs but now its price margins just about match anywhere else in London, if not a little lower. The pubs themselves are becoming ramshackle, barren and generally closed down (over 100 of their pubs are closed up north, as they can't find anyone willing to manage them). The intense mind games the area managers and company archons, who are generally entirely aloof from the managers and their staff, are thus their tactic of squeezing their remaining managers to maximum efficiency.
One of my managers had a mental breakdown. The other two are simply caught, being unable to escape as Samuel Smith have subtly made them dependant with the live in, holding their deposit and keeping the hamsters in the ball with the terrible salary. I myself was quickly enrolled in the great game of Samuel Smith politics, finding myself (only being 24, and in london at that point for 5 months) actually managing one of their pubs. I can vouch, if only for a bit, the sheer psychological emaciation your subjected to from the company, and won't go into the details save belittlement, alienation and insane pressure, with absolutely no reprieve. So, I decided to leave. I'm still waiting for an unspoken but relatively substantial sum of money, which I haven't been paid. I don't expect to ever see it.
Samuel Smiths has had a notorious history. But for its faults, the pubs themselves have always been aesthetically beautiful, the beers incredibly cheap and crackin quality, and the punters grander than life and atmosphere jovial. Since Covid, that has understandably changed. But don't be fooled into thinking that the sudden rising price in London of Samuel Smiths has anything other to do with their absolutely atrocious business strategy, which walks hands in hand with their exploitative tactics. This is a company in serious need both of a systematic autopsy and a monitored standard, because as I can vouch for most of my fellow comrades, fuck does it need one. I could honestly go on for days, but I haven't the thumb speed or strength anymore. So, next time you're nursing that admittedly blessèd Double Four, just keep a wiley on on your barman. They might be pouring ales like a horse plays tennis, hooves for hands, but there's a reason for this. For those caught in the whirlwind, it can be a serious, health eroding reason.
Stay groovy and free-caring fellas, and stay savvy not to fall into the emotional snare of exploitative labour!