Gloucester Old Spot pub to go on the market as owners announce intention to retire

Published by

Peter Davison

Award-winning Gloucestershire pub The Gloucester Old Spot is to to go on the market after the owners announced their intention to retire.

Simon and Kate Daws are hanging up their aprons after a career spanning 44 years in hospitality and 23 years in the pub trade.

In preparation for their retirement, they are seeking new owners to take their award-winning pub, which they purchased in 2010, into the future.

“With a pub as historic as The Gloucester Old Spot, in many respects, any owner is only a custodian for a period of time," said simon.

"We have a fantastic team and an amazingly loyal customer base at The Gloucester Old Spot. We are immensely proud of what this team has achieved, having turned what was essentially a drinking pub into a seven days a week food and drink destination with an excellent reputation.

"We have invested several hundred thousands of pounds into the pub, and increased its total capacity to around 290 covers a sitting.

“If Britain’s best-selling guide, The Good Pub Guide is to be believed The Gloucester Old Spot is among the very best pubs in Cheltenham, and in Gloucestershire and The Cotswolds for that matter, as we one of only three pubs in this ‘bible’ of the traditional pub world to have a star rating. We have also won the Good Food and Real Ale Awards too.

“With the plans to make junction 10 of the M5 two way in 2026, this will significantly improve access and passing trade. This combined with the development plans for the immediate local area, mean that that the future prospects for the pub are excellent. This is why we felt the time was right for us to move on and let somebody take the pub into the next chapter of its history."

Simon and Kate’s career in hospitality began in the 1980s in some of Cheltenham’s hotels, pubs and fast-food outlets.

They first moved into their own pub in 2000 when they became Landlord and Landlady of The Royal Oak Inn, Prestbury, which was then an Enterprise Inns pub.

They built the pub’s customer base, extended the premises and kitchens as well as revamping its function room and outside space.

It was then in May 2010 they purchased their second leasehold pub, The Gloucester Old Spot, and soon after purchased the freehold of both pubs in June 2012.

They then consequently sold The Royal Oak to Butcombe Brewery in 2017.

Since owning The Gloucester Old Spot they have refurbished the pub and kitchen facilities throughout and created the unique baronial style dedicated Dining Room.

They have also significantly expanded and enhanced their outside space including creating astroturf, lawned, patio and barn areas for year round all weather use, now rated as one of the top 100 UK Pub gardens by Tom Parker-Bowles.

“The Gloucester Old Spot has built up a fantastic reputation and we are looking for someone to take on the reigns of whom we can be confident will take great care of the establishment and the excellent team here," said Kate.

"We suspect that the pub will be attractive to investors, given the turnover which we have increased 15 times in our tenure and the industry-leading return on investment that it offers."

Peter Davison

Peter Davison is deputy editor of The Business Magazine. He has spent his life in journalism – doing work experience in newsrooms in and around Bristol while still at school, and landing his first job on a local newspaper aged 19. By 28 he was the youngest newspaper editor in the country. An early advocate of online news, he spent the first years of the 2000s telling his bosses that the internet posed both the biggest opportunity and greatest threat to the newspaper industry and the art of journalism. He was right on both counts. Since 2006 he has enjoyed a career as a freelance journalist. He lives in rural Wiltshire with one wife, two children, and three cats.