Сетевые пабы Scream в Великобритании: история и трансформация

Scream (formerly known as It's A Scream) was a student oriented pub chain in the United Kingdom owned by the Stonegate Pub Company. The chain began in October 1995.

The pub chain was set up by brewers Bass, who called it, It's a Scream. The pubs were all within relatively short walking distance of a university. Bass's retail arm became Mitchells & Butlers in April 2003. Scream was disposed of by Mitchells and Butlers on 20 August 2010, along with around 300 other Mitchells and Butlers pubs for £373m to Stonegate (owned by TDR Capital).

Scream pubs were aimed at the student market, and mostly found near to universities. They claimed to be 'the number one choice of students'. Its chief competitor was Varsity, owned at the time by the Barracuda Group, although Varsity had a more mainstream market – often concentrating on football matches on Sky Sports and located closer to town centres. Varsity became part of Stonegate in 2013. The original name came from the 1893 painting The Scream, by the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch, which is a popular poster image with many students. The painting was formerly shown on some pub signs of the former It's A Scream chain. The pubs each had individual items, for example a giant monkey mural (Horn in Hand), a talking moose's head (White Harte, Bristol), an aardvark costume (The Aardvark, Coventry) or a large painting of a Phoenix (The Phoenix, Coventry) and their own sign relating to their name. Some went further, such as the Dry Dock in Leeds and Leicester which were built inside an old grounded ship. Scream pubs had a loyalty card scheme known as The Yellow Card. It was available to students annually for £1 (originally free) and entitled them to discounts on selected food and drink. In November 2006, selected Scream Pubs had been chosen to run a trial wherein they did not sell Yellow Cards. With the introduction of the new Scottish Licensing Laws on 1 September 2009, Yellow Cards purchased in Scream pubs in Scotland would not be valid until 72 hours after purchase. In the Summer of 2003, Scream introduced the "Yellow Card For Life" – costing £5, with the promise that it will never expire.

Starting with the Southfield, Stonegate began converting existing Scream sites to a new 'Common Room' brand, rather than branding each site as a uniform segment, instead brands each site individually. The sites focus more on casual dining and an emerging interest in craft beer. Typically sites having converted to the new brand saw an increase in sales of roughly 60%, with success based on a change to multiple visits by customers during the day.