Monday 23 September 2013

WhatPub - nationwide online pub guide launched

CAMRA, the Campaign for Real Ale, has today launched its first ever national online pub guide  – whatpub.com - dedicated to helping the public find the best pubs to suit their needs across  Britain.
  
Following an extensive two year project by thousands of CAMRA volunteers, whatpub.com features  47,000 pubs, around 36,000 of which serve real ale – making the site the most definitive online  guide to real ale in the UK.
 
Whatpub.com, which has been designed to automatically optimise for use on laptops, tablets and  mobile devices, offers over thirty different search fields ranging from dog friendly pubs to those  that offer newspapers or live music, making the results customizable to each person’s individual  preferences.

Another key feature is that of the 35,800 real ale pubs featured, around 22,000 have details of the real ales being served – taking the guess work out of a visit for real ale lovers. 

Locally, our branch has listed every single pub in our branch area, over 600 pubs, with the help of our branch members.  This includes opening hours, real ales available - both regular and guests,  food availability, other local information on location and transport and also a photograph of the pub.

Andy Shaw, CAMRA Director said:  “CAMRA has developed WhatPub to be the ultimate online pub  guide for all pub-goers. It may even help encourage people who have stopped using pubs regularly,  since WhatPub will help them find the ideal pub to suit their needs.”
 
WhatPub entries are written by local CAMRA members and then approved by dedicated branch  volunteers.

A full entry offers a description and pictures of the pub, the address, opening hours, who  owns it, lists the regular real ales they stock, states whether the pub offers Guest Beers, highlights  the pubs main features e.g. availability of food, gives a map of where the pub can be located, sat nav  reference, OS reference and highlights the local transport available.
 
WhatPub also allows CAMRA members to score the quality of the real ales served in the pub which  helps CAMRA select entries for a number of local and national publications.

Mr Shaw commented on the entries: “WhatPub differs from many other pub websites which are  based on details provided by the person who owns the pub, who may be a little biased! I would like  to thank the thousands of CAMRA volunteers for their time and effort in submitting these entries. It is  this process that makes WhatPub totally independent.”

He concluded: “WhatPub has plenty more future planned developments but we are very proud  of the website launched today and CAMRA hopes everybody will enjoy using it.”