Challenge to Londoners to do a Mindful Pub Crawl

Club Soda and Blenheim have teamed up to launch the first ever pub guide for mindful drinkers and to accompany the launch, they are challenging Londoners to do a Mindful Pub Crawl in January.

A Mindful Pub Crawl is a pub crawl with a difference. Instead of boozing to excess, it’s about sampling drinks a little less ordinary, with low or no alcohol. Hop from one bar to the next, test pubs on their alcohol-free beers, creative mocktails, craft sodas and rate them.

Timed to coincide with the traditional January health kick, clubsodaguide.com has been supported by 200 of the best pubs and bars in Hackney and the City of London.

The Guide is designed to help customers navigate the best places to go out when they want to drink less. But it also gets pubs to look after their non-drinking customers more and points them to useful case studies and product ideas. Each venue has entered details about the low and no alcohol drinks they stock into the Guide and been given a score out of 5, along with advice on how to improve their score.

Club Soda co-founders Laura Willoughby MBE and ex-City banker Jussi Tolvi said:

“We created the Club Soda Guide to help everyone discover good places for mindful drinkers. We are so convinced you can go to the pub and stay healthy that we are challenging Londoners to use the Guide, do a mindful pub crawl, and review the best places. We will even send you a mindful pub crawl kit⁵ packed full of pub games and drink ideas to get you started.”

The Club Soda Guide’s mindful pub crawl challenge is a way for Londoners to support their local pubs and improve their health. January is traditionally a time for healthy New Year’s resolutions, with over 2 million people in the UK taking a month off booze. Many people reducing their units and counting their calories often tend to avoid pubs, whose profits plummet.

Sharon Daughter, Director of Services at Blenheim said:

“This is a great opportunity for people who want to reduce or stop their drinking, permanently or for a short period, and don’t want to miss out on meeting up with friends and going out. We think this is a fantastic start to making pubs more welcoming places for everyone.”

Anyone can run their own Mindful Pub Crawl, or join one of the Club Soda Guide Crawls. The launch mindful pub crawl is on Thursday 5th January, from 7pm at the five star rated Draft House on Plough Place, in the City of London.

We are asking people to review the venues they visit on the Club Soda Guide online, and will be rewarding the top venues in February. We plan to go nationwide with the Guide later in 2017.

The guide has been developed in partnership with Blenheim and with funding from Hackney and City of London, The Big Lottery Fund and the RSA. It has been developed as a result of Hackney funded research undertaken by Club Soda looking at the best ways to change the behaviour of pubs and bars - you can see that research on nudgingpubs.uk.

Notes:

1. Media opportunity: The launch Mindful Pub Crawl is at 7pm on Thursday 5th January starting at the Draft House. It will be attended by people Mindful Drinking this January, and there will be opportunities for interviews with Laura, Jussi, Club Soda members, and pub and bar managers. Other events can be seen here: http://clubsodaguide.com/category/events/
2. A full press pack with everything you need for background, funders, photos, facts and figures can be found here: http://clubsodaguide.com/category/press/.
3. We can offer you awesome top tips for a dry January for columns you are writing http://clubsodaguide.com/category/press/
4. What is “Mindful Drinking”? Hell, we are not stick in the muds! You could be on a diet, cutting down on booze, or just not drinking tonight, but still want to go to the pub. So we have found the best pubs that care about your drinking habits AND the quality of your night out!
5. What is in the Mindful Pub Crawl pack? It is full of pub games, “draw your own” beer mats, drink ideas, and top tips for a night out without a hangover. Sign up here: http://clubsodaguide.com/mindful-pub-crawl/
6. How to use a mindful pub crawl to raise funds for dry January and Dryathlon? Ask your mates to sponsor you for every pub you go to in January without drinking, or organise a pub crawl using the Guide and charge your mates to come along.
7. Club Soda is a healthy lifestyle movement that helps people change their drinking, whether they want to do a sober sprint, drink more mindfully, or go alcohol-free. Visit joinclubsoda.co.uk - we are available for quotes, case studies, information and advice for your articles all year round.
8. The Guide is produced in partnership with Blenheim. Blenheim is a leading charity that has been supporting people with alcohol and substance misuse issues across London for over 50 years.