Just reading this excellent article:

lunchtime pints key to economic recovery

Got me thinking, and reminiscing, especially this….

Throughout the 80s and early 90s, office workers would flee the office like rats out of a trap at half twelve – twelve on Fridays – heading straight for the pub.

Now I’m old enough to remember this culture. Fondly. I’ve worked in a few places ‘back in the day’ where the whole office (and I do mean everyone!) would de-camp to the pub next door for an extended liquid lunch, every single day. If we didn’t have much on, sometimes we’d stay there all afternoon. These were city centre ‘creative’ agencies, where nobody drove there, so you didn’t have to worry about that. A principle most enthusiastically embraced. I worked for one large national publishing group where it seemed like most things were somehow achieved by a workforce that was pretty much constantly pissed! That inevitably what you get with an office full of deadline driven journo’s, designers and photographers (all total pissheads). I can certainly identify with this…

Returning from the pub to the office you feel sleepy, and entering a waking-dream state which is when you have your cleverest thoughts. I call it the ‘creative stupor’

During that time (the 90’s) I worked with some truly heroic drinkers. The man-mountain of a creative director who would sink 5 pints of Guinness every lunchtime. Apparently he went straight to the pub from work and would put another 10 away in the evening. The partners-in-crime art director and senior account handler who took advantage of a local bars 2-for-1 offer with a healthy, nutritious, balanced daily lunch off a bottle of Shiraz each. I don’t think I ever saw anybody eat anything more than a packet of crisps.

So I just wondered, as this is meedya, and not the real world, what are your memories of the lunchtime pint (or 3, possibly 5). What industry are you in, and was it a done thing? Were you regularly half cooked in the office?

And more importantly, should we be revising this noble tradition 😀

Friday lunch drinks were a solid tradition (a bar on site helped) especially during the summer, everyone would head over for a few. There were a couple of soaks who could just shovel it away.
Late shifts were good.
Meal break between 7-8. Four pints were quite easy (that sounds a little lightweight given the current context!)

The tales the older guys tell are quite funny….

Don’t do it anymore as I am a teacher. When I was a plasterer it was two pints every Friday in the nearest pub,and Monday. In THAT LONDON it was 4 on a Friday. May I take the oppo to apologise for anybody who I did work for on a Friday pm…

When I worked at the MOD we had a bar on site which was open at lunchtime and a pub a few minutes up the road on the island. Both were popular and while my role as a photographer really demanded I partake the thought of mixing alcohol and explosives never really appealed.

Where I worked latterly, the malt whisky society wasn’t that far away to walk. Deadly.
And before that, yes would wander down Easter Road and somehow omit to return, on quiet days..

I Know a CD who had a phone line installed in the pub next door while at one of the big 4 letter acronym agencies in the 80/90’s. now has his own small agency and runs it as a high functioning alcoholic.

‘way back when’ as an assistant photographer in the days of shooting 10×8 film there was a lot of waiting around and often we were shooting just 1 shot a day so i spent a lot of time in the Eagle (first gastro pub in london, just up from the old Guardian building) and the back of my head is in a pic in the Eagle recipe book. often would have the film couriered there and half cut AD’s would just hold them up against the window and not bother changing anything.

i remember one job for AMD processors where the large shiny processor thing was set up and lit and a couple of sheets of film shot by 9:30 am, film back an hour and 20 later and the art director turns up, takes one look and says “great”. straight down the local bar/restaurant for the rest of the day.

it’s not like that any more and i’m actually quite glad it isn’t.

edit: other half is now an AD at one of those big acronym agencies and they have free drinks on thursdays and the CD will plonk a beer on your desk at 5:30 and insist you drink it. it’s not a ‘drinking culture’ agency though

Yeah in the 80s and 90s you almost had to go to the pub at lunchtime. The smell of booze hung heavy in the air during the afternoon

At the time our enginnering place was near to an independant brewery and we often used to take the incoming sales reps round at lunchtime and the barman would spike their (already lethal) pint

They gave some hilarious presentations in the afternooon 🙂

Friday lunchtimes are religiously ‘2 pint Friday’ – only a small subsection of staff. It’s the best thing about the job.

as a new graduate arrival into the world of property in the late 90s, lunchtimes would be scattered over any number of Mayfair bars. After the first 6 months I realised I couldnt keep this up as a) grad salaries on Hanover square were annoyingly unable to keep up with those levels of consumption and 2) Id recently taken on a project for the US State Department that meant taking conference calls at 5pm and it wouldnt do to be talking gibberish all the time.

These days, as a man of greater leisure and surprisingly deeper pockets, when I’m in London, once my colleague and I have wrapped up meetings for the day (whether it be 11am or 4pm) we retire to the nearest hole and natter over a few pints before I have to find a train home.

However I’m at home most of the time. And am today. So am meeting my dad for a pint in the local at lunchtime. I doubt it will improve my afternoon creativity though.

I had my 18th birthday whilst on work experience with an ad agency. A couple of the blokes from sales took me to the pub, forced a few pints down my neck and then took me to the bookies to place my first bet!

Those places seemed to attract divorced, middle-aged alcoholics. The air was constantly thick with cigarette smoke and the smell of last night’s curry and booze.

I remember getting into work one morning to find one of the sales guys slumped over a wall-heater with a mug of tea boiling away next to him. I rolled him off to find his face burnt and his jacket welded onto him! He’d gone for a pint the previous lunctime, stayed out to 2am and thought he’d just go and sleep in the office. He’d obviously tried to snuggle up to this wall heater which had come on full blast at 8am!

I still know the guy and he still has the scars!

I think the late noughties recession had a lot to do with its decline (or at least in the industry I work). Suddenly people who had time to spend in the pub during working hours were deemed surplus to requirements, or the clients they were taking out decided it would be best to be at their desk looking like they were working hard to justify their job.

Friday was referred to as POETS day (P*ss off early, tomorrow’s Saturday).

Having said that I know a few people in commercial property who still seem to spend a large amount of time in the pub.

I don’t think I’ve ever worked where it’s been the “culture.” A pub lunch has been common enough, getting some actual food and washing it down with a pint of something nice (occasionally, but rarely, two). I don’t think I’ve worked anywhere where it’s been frowned upon socially, though official policy has sometimes forbidden it.

I can’t remember the last time I did it, not for a year or two now. Perhaps a big part of that is that all my ‘team’ are remote and it’s no fun going on your own. Though we did have a barbecue at work last week, with free beer laid on. Which was nice.

Started life as a sparks….beers during working hours were few and far between.

Then I was lucky enough to blag a job in IT, started at the bottom, batch runs, tape monkey etc…Within a couple of weeks I was asked to do some overtime on a Saturday.

Come lunch time, boss and a few others decided it was time for a pint of several. I thought, okay, one hour, we’ll head back…lasted about 2.5 hours.

By the time I got back I had to walk around a data centre the size of two football pitches loading up tapes….I struggled to fit a few of the correct tapes into the correct loaders a few times.

Made a decision there and then….

…

…

…I needed to improve my drinking capabilities then and there.

I’ve dedicated many years to my rigorous training….those were the days…I suppose riding in most days puts a stop to getting wangered at work…although funnily enough something big is planned for tonight….my head is already hurting just thinking about tomorrow morning….actually reformed character…don’t like wasting time being in a ship state.

As a Dr, not part of the culture these days, and never was really more than a lunchtime pint if on-call was quiet at a weekend.

We did used to crack open a bottle of wine at the close of play on Friday.

Happy days

I have never worked anywhere like what you describe Binners, I think it might be a combination of the work culture in UK and that industry.

My first working years were in New Zealand, people work a LOT harder generally and getting drunk in work hours would get you fired pretty quickly.

I’ve never worked anywhere like that, but we did have a ridiculous drinking culture in sixth form. Pound a pint in the local seemed a better use of lunch money than, er, lunch.

God knows how I got into university 😯

My second real job was at the Bank of England (New Change site near St Pauls) back in the late 1980s. Culture was to go to the pub for a few then to return to the downstairs bar for a couple more. Reasoning was that we’d returned to the office before our lunch break had finished even if we were in the bar.

Now, lunch time drinking is a pint on a ride if I’m WFH. Can’t ride straight on more than a pint anymore 🙁

Throughout the 80s and early 90s,…

I was starting primary school, so maybe that’s why I ‘missed out’ but I’ve never worked somewhere with the culture described.

I think it’s gross misconduct here, but then if the ‘customer’ facing staff did it then people would (in all seriousness) probably die. Or more of them would die, anyway.

In the 80’s Friday lunchtime was either The Bradley Hall or The Crown. At least two pints was the norm, having consumed sandwiches in the office beforehand. I would add that this was in the days of an hour for lunch rather than the paltry 30 mins that is now common. As senior managers and directors were also in the pub occasionally this would stretch to 2 hours ans result in more junior members of staff having to be helped back to their desks.

Miss those days. Friday really meant something then.

Free beer and Pizza whilst working at my first job in Australia.

Everything else about it was shite however.

A former colleague from 20 years ago would regularly be sur-les-piss at lunch and again straight after before taking the train him. On more than one occasion he fell asleep and would be roused by a cleaner when it arrived in Barrow or Colwyn Bay.

His drinking because so bad that it led to medical problems and him eventually leaving the job.

I feel sorry for the younger ones in our office. The lunchtime drinking and hangover recovery sessions used to be legendary. ‘Twas the recession that screwed it up. Everyone we have taken on recently remembers not having a job so they all work far too hard and tend to go running at lunchtime rather than drinking. Tedious for all involved really, the the drinking/ recovering where always good sport for the others.

When I first started working in the 1980’s it wasn’t unusual to have a drink at lunchtime especially on a Thur/Fri and with clients (Brits not Americans). Pretty much unheard of today with colleagues but still may have a glass of wine at a client lunch. Of course in France it’s quite normal to have a glass of wine over any sort of lunch, colleagues or clients. Drinking with colleagues has now switched to an early 5pm pint or two, still common to have a work night out on say a Thursday. Lunch for me is at the desk, usually with something bought from a lady who does the rounds to the office or bought in the morning on the way to work.

Worked for “a large telecommunications company” in various offices around central Bristol throughout the 90s. Various sales support and techie roles. In all of them, lunchtime drinking (actually drinking generally) was the rule rather than exception. On Fridays we’d often not come back.

At one point they had a bonus scheme paid in High Street vouchers (remember them?). One of the more enterprising of the team persuaded a local pub to take them (The King William on King Street if anyone knows it), so come the end of the month everyone would troop over at lunchtime and hand over a stack of vouchers to the landlord in exchange for bar credits which he totted up in a big black book behind the bar. It was like a second home to most of us. Upstairs bar was like a private members club for those “in the know” with some epic lock-ins.

Later worked over in Whitefriars doing tech support – at lunchtime, evening shifts and weekends (pretty much most of the time in fact) a significant number of the IT team would be in the Artichoke pub next door (now gone) with phones on divert to their mobiles or on walkie-talkies. It was basically an extension to the office and informally known as Conference Room 5 by pretty much everyone in the business.

After that I worked in Holland for a bit where we had a bar on site and were encourage to have a beer at our desks on Fridays.

Then came back and did 9 years in the rail industry where it’s obviously a complete no-no with some folk even being subject to random testing.

In my first qualified law job there was only me and the boss in the team, she didn’t work Fridays, I often over indulged at lunches, thankfully it never caught up with me…

I worked in an architects practice when I was 19, not at all uncommon for the partners to take me out for lunch and me to have to sleep head down on my desk all afternoon.
I now run factories, so heavy machinery + boozing is a bad idea.
Recently went to Germany for a machinery show though, and everyone (I do mean everyone) stopped for a beer at lunchtime, and seemed to carry on drinking all afternoon.
Nobody was pissed though, I know what free beer at a show would do to the UK working population!

An old office I used to work in had a mini-pub in it. Fireplace, armchairs, pumps, optics, fridge full of cans and an honesty system. There were never more than about 10 of us in the building on any given day and frequently only 5 or 6.

You could see the faces of visitors just light up and then go slightly glazed as they mentally planned their own office pub!

Nobody was pissed though

+1

Kind of strange really. Cheerful, more relaxed, happy to be at work with other people but not pissed

I blame the ability to wfh on a Friday for its demise. Working agility has seen the death of it.

On a Friday if you couldn’t find the project resource you needed you always checked the pub over the road first.

It was basically an extension to the office and informally known as Conference Room 5 by pretty much everyone in the business.

When I was at the afore-mentioned large national publishing house (lefty, nott veri gud at spelin) Atlas Bar on Deansgate was referred to as ‘The Office’, as it was where we could be found most of the time. 😀

Gillette in Isleworth (site sold to a hotel years ago) had a bar with two full size snooker tables in it! Run by the old boys too knackered to work on the factory floor anymore. Most of my work was out of hours back then and if we let the fellas know, they’d keep the bar open for us 🙂

Also did a lot of work for a private oil and gas consultancy in London. IT Director was an alcoholic. Never saw him eat. 3 pints min every lunchtime. Many more in the evening but never looked pissed and was still somehow bloody good at his job. I’d had ruined by the end of the 2nd day.

Don’t really miss it tho. Much 😉

I blame the ability to wfh on a Friday for its demise.

b l x – in I.T., like other industries where there was legendary lunchtime drinking, it was the gradual Americanisation of the industry, outsourcing and no new blood.
‘merkin corp’s don’t look kindly on lunchtime drinking and then the teams were stripped and the remainder on-shore didn’t have time to have a drink.

In the late 90s/early 00s I worked for an environmental/engineering consultancy. The office was next door to a public. We went there most lunchtimes and always on a Friday.

ooh been there, though it was only around 2001 to 2005. It was/is petrochemical sector, i remember many a Friday sitting in the beer garden having too many, strolling back 2-3 hours later if at all and then trying to work. The FD at the time was a massive pi55head and also like to dabble in the psychogenic stuff, he would quite often pay for my drinks.. happy days, although not very productive.

What DaRC_L said,

American corps applied their on site rules to the office staff, so goodbye lunchtime drinks.

Although we make a point of taking our US clients to the pub opposite for lunch and getting them beers.

The Patent Office used to have an on site bar, my old boss could get through 4-5 pints of cider and the afternoon was written off. Amazing to think of that now but then nobody batted an eyelid.

sadly the engineering consultancy business has fallen foul of this ‘lack of friday pint’ culture.

when i started a friday pint or 3 was lovely.

the company i did my work experience with we took a few extra long friday lunches. if we were busy we didnt but the option was there…

For over 3 years, I worked for a certain boss. He would roll out of bed, not have breakfast and be driven to work. He would then fill his personal coffee machine and drink a full jug of black coffee before lunch. Several lunchtimes per week he would have a couple of pints with his lunch.
I’m not saying he was a bit of a roller coaster to work for, but he was.

My first summer job was for a roofing company. Fridays were pay day, so lunchtime in the pub. The problem afterwards was carrying buckets of liquid bitumen (ie hot) up ladders.

I started work after the demise of lunchtime drinking but every month we have a few renegades who slope off to the pub for a few cheeky beers on a Friday lunchtime. Such rebellion!