The future of its cricket team may still be up in the air after a controversy over secret payments to certain players last season.
Now the landlord of the pub said to be the inspiration for Ambridge’s local in The Archers says his business is also under threat – because of Rachel Reeves’ tax raid.
The half-timbered Old Bull Inn has sat on the village green in Inkberrow, Worcestershire, since the 16th Century and counts William Shakespeare among its former customers.
But landlord Joe Reed warned he may have to consider calling time for good because of the Chancellor’s changes to business rates on the back of an earlier hike to employers’ National Insurance contributions.
Inkberrow, judged England’s prettiest village in 2023, is renowned as the real-life version of Ambridge, the home of BBC Radio 4’s The Archers.
The Old Bull Inn is said to be the model for The Bull, which has been a staple of the long-running serial and is described as also being a ‘half-timbered building near the village green’ in BBC publicity material.
And just like its fictional namesake, the flagstone-floored pub is the epicentre of the village and its central social hub.
Fans of the show, now celebrating its 75th anniversary, flock to the idyllic spot in the summer months to sup pints like ‘Ambridge locals’ – and take in memorabilia such as signed scripts and cast photos which adorn the pub’s walls.
Landlord Joe Reed says he works 60 hour weeks at The Old Bull, but times remain tough
The flagstone-floored pub is the epicentre of the village and its central social hub
The Old Bull has plenty of Archers memorabelia, some gathered during visits from cast members
‘Trade remains fairly steady’, Mr Reed said. ‘It’s all the extra costs that are causing the issue.
‘We put the hours in – I work around 60 hours a week – and it would be nice to be rewarded for that.’
In the November Budget, Ms Reeves announced that Covid-era 40 per cent business rates relief would end this April and hit pubs with a revaluation of the tax.
The changes meant pubs were set to face huge increases in their business rates and hospitality chiefs warned this, coupled with an increase in the minimum wage and the hike in employer National Insurance contributions, could force hundreds of boozers to the wall.
The fierce backlash saw more than 1,000 landlords bar Labour MPs and led to a climbdown and the announcement of a Treasury support package.
The package involves pubs in England getting 15 per cent off their business rates next year, with bills then frozen in real terms for a further two years.
Shadow Chancellor Mel Stride said the package would ‘only delay the pain for a while’ and Mr Reed, 70, agreed, accusing the Chancellor of just ‘kicking the can down the road’.
Warning of more pub closures to come, he added: ‘Over three years we will transfer from the old rates to the new rates, in a step increment.
Actress Sunny Ormonde as The Bull’s co-owner Lilian Bellamy in the long-running radio serial
Archers fans regularly visit to take in memorabilia such as signed scripts and cast photos which adorn the pub’s walls.
‘But in three years’ time we will be in trouble again, potentially doubling our rates.
‘We are still solvent, but we are fortunate in that we get tourists coming here because of the link to The Archers…but still we’re not making a killing.
‘We are paying the bills but that’s about it. The days of making big profits are long gone.’
Mr Reed, who has been landlord of the Stonegate Group-owned pub since 2019, said the Chancellor’s decision to hike employers’ National Insurance contributions from 13.8 per cent to 15 per cent in her first budget in 2024 had already ‘put the wage bill up hugely’.
‘We have eight members of staff – one full-time and the others part-time’, he said.
The half-timbered pub sits by the village green in Inkberrow, just like the boozer in fictional Ambridge
The Bull’s landlady Jolene Archer (played by Buffy Davis) and husband Kenton (Richard Attlee) in an old publicity shot
‘We have had to put a halt to all recruiting, so we’re having to run around doing stuff ourselves a lot more than before.’
He also fears his rent will also go up when it is next reassessed in two years.
‘Combined with the rate increases it makes me seriously consider whether it’s worth carrying on’, Mr Reed said.
An analysis of Valuation Office Agency figures shows more than 500 pubs have closed since Labour came to power in July 2024.
Archers listeners last week heard that there’s still bad feeling in the village over the controversial decision to secretly pay some players in the village cricket team last season following its promotion, only for the season to end in relegation in any case.
Club captain Freddie Pargetter, who went along with the payment plan, called a meeting to discuss the way forward at The Old Bull – only to get sidetracked on a client visit and forget to attend. The no-show prompted village hunk Chris Carter to suggest that it could spell the ‘end of the cricket team’ because ‘the others won’t give him another chance now’.
William Shakespeare is said to have stopped off at The Old Bull on his way from Stratford-upon-Avon to Worcester to collect his marriage licence to Anne Hathaway.
Archers creator Godfrey Baseley, who was born in Alvechurch, Worcestershire, was also known to drink at the pub.
Inkberrow, as well as other nearby locations such as Hanbury – where Mr Baseley’s sister-in-law had a farm – has featured in publicity material for the Archers, which is recorded in Birmingham, 23 miles north.
