Save the rural pub!
There was a time when the pubs in Ireland were almost an extension of the sitting room. You knew who would be sitting at the counter, who would wander in around six o'clock and who would say they were only staying for one drink and never did.
The pub was where you met friends, heard the local news, celebrated good news and sometimes sought refuge from the weather or from the family. You knew the landlord or lady and their kids working the bar who knew exactly what you were going to order just by looking up and making eye contact.
But it seems, these days might well be in the past soon. The LVA (Licensed Vintners Association) published a survey that shows that 2,205 pubs have disappeared in Ireland since 2005, a fall of 25.6 per cent.
That is an average of around 110 pubs closing every year. Limerick, Offaly, Monaghan, Tipperary and Cork haven been particularly badly affected, with the number of pubs falling by around 33 per cent for Cork alone over the same period.
That is a third of our pubs disappearing. Irish pub culture is unique, or at least it was. Go everywhere in the world and you will see copies of Irish pubs trying to re-create the special atmosphere of an Irish country pub.
Losing so many should be a concern. These aren't just numbers on a spreadsheet. Every closed pub represents a business, jobs, families and in rural Ireland, somewhere for people to meet.
The latest figures show that 86 pubs closed in 2025, compared with 65 in 2024 and 117 in 2023. So the annual number isn't rising every year but the long-term direction is unmistakable.
I am still lucky to have pubs nearby were I don’t have to ‘wait to be seated’ and almost having to apologise for just wanting a drink.
In Blarney we have the Muskerry Arms, Johnny’s and closer to home, Browne’s. Reading an article by Bord Bia, coffee culture seems to be, maybe not replacing our pubs just yet, but definitely growing in Ireland.
Don’t get me wrong, I do like a nice cup of tea with a sneaky carrot cake but not at 10pm when I am chatting to Richie or Sean.
Bord Bia's 2025 Market Insights Report found that coffee shops and cafés grew by 5.2 per cent across Ireland in 2025 (this includes chains like Starbucks etc).
This doesn't mean that every pub that closes is being replaced by a café but there does seem to have been a fundamental change in what we expect from a place where we go to eat and socialise.
A café can be many things. It can be somewhere to meet a friend at 10am, take the children for a hot chocolate, work on the laptop, have lunch, read the paper or sit alone without feeling remotely uncomfortable about it.
It fits neatly into a lifestyle where people might be driving, working remotely, meeting during the day or simply choosing not to drink.
I can't help wondering what we lose when the pub disappears. A good café can provide food, coffee and conversation but a traditional pub can be woven deeply into the heart of a community.
When a rural pub closes, there may be no obvious replacement for that social space. Maybe the future isn't about choosing between pubs and cafés. We need both. We need places for morning coffee and places for an evening pint. We need somewhere to meet in the daytime and somewhere to linger after dark.
Once a pub disappears, it is very difficult to recreate the role it played in a community. And while I am very fond of a good espresso, I would hate to discover that one day the only place left to hear the local gossip is over a slice of banana bread.