Family brewery expands pub portfolio

By Nicky Godding

5 April 2024

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Chris Manners, George Arkell, Leo Johnson and Alex Arkell celebrate the opening of The Airs and Graces

Arkell’s Brewery has added another venue to its ever-expanding list of pubs, this time, another in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.

The Wiltshire brewer purchased The Sudeley Arms, located on the corner of Prestbury Road and Portland Square, last December, and has now completed a full refurbishment with its new tenants – Dodo Pub Co, to a cost of nearly one million pounds.

Dodo has renamed the pub The Airs & Graces, after the cockney rhyming slang for the races which felt like the natural choice being so close to the racecourse.

This is the second pub Arkell’s has purchased in Gloucestershire in the last two years, and this time they have partnered with Dodo, who also run The Bottle of Sauce on Ambrose Street in Cheltenham.

Arkell’s managing director, George Arkell said: “Since COVID, the hospitality trade has been under huge pressure, however, well run community focused pubs are still fantastic businesses to be involved with. The Airs and Graces, run by the enthusiastic pub group Dodo and its young team, fits squarely in that category. Over the last two years we have invested well over five million pounds in upgrading our existing pubs and purchasing new ones, and we were really excited to have been able to get The Airs & Graces open in time for Easter.

“We have collaborated with Dodo for more than 10 years in Cheltenham and Oxfordshire, and love their enthusiasm and support for the local community. We are sure they will do a fantastic job here and that the ‘Airs and Graces’ will be a great addition to Cheltenham.”

Co-founder of Dodo, Leo Johnson, added: “We’ve been looking for an eighth site for a while and expanding in Cheltenham seemed like the natural choice for us.”

The ‘Airs & Graces’ officially opened its doors on 28 March.

By Nicky Godding

Nicky Godding is editor of The Business Magazine. Before her journalism career, she worked mainly in public relations moving into writing when she was invited to launch Retail Watch, a publication covering retail and real estate across Europe.

After some years of constant travelling, she tucked away her passport and concentrated on business writing, co-founding a successful regional business magazine. She has interviewed some of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs who have built multi-million-pound businesses and reported on many science and technology firsts.

She reports on the region’s thriving business economy from start-ups, family businesses and multi-million-pound corporations, to the professionals that support their growth and the institutions that educate the next generation of business leaders.