Spotlight on Chandlers bar

Spotlight on Chandlers bar, St Mary's Gate, Chesterfield.

Transcript

00:00 My name is Roger Butler. I've been the licensee here since 1999, so we're coming up on 25 years.

00:07 25 years ago we were very much a bar that was looking after the 18 to 30 group and as time has

00:15 gone on we seem to still have that same 18 to 30 group that kind of come along the journey with us

00:20 so our clientele have got much older and we've lost some of the younger people coming through

00:26 but they're still quite nice because they've been coming a long time. We had lockdown obviously, we

00:30 didn't want to sit around doing nothing so we started doing the refurbishment of the upstairs

00:35 of Chandler's. This used to be a hotel, it's been a hotel since I think 1780 I think, it's quite a

00:40 long time. It got completely demolished and rebuilt in 1926 which is the building we've got now,

00:45 but when we took it over as a hotel it was quite dilapidated and run down and we've always wanted

00:52 to try and do something about it and bring it back up and we've now had the chance to do that.

00:56 With lockdown we were able to put in soundproofing throughout the entire building because of the time

01:02 that we were shut which was lovely and we're now turning the upstairs into essentially Airbnb rooms.

01:07 There's going to be three rather lovely rooms. One should have a roof terrace, hopefully eventually

01:15 a hot tub, that's that's something to come, but the three lovely rooms are going to be called

01:19 inspired rooms because I think we've been inspired to get the work done up there and there's some

01:25 interesting little bits and pieces with it. I've made all the lights for the upstairs out of pipes

01:31 and bottles so we've always got plenty of lamps for it because if one breaks we can just come and

01:35 get another one from the bar, works a treat. I love being part of Chandler's, I mean I think that

01:42 Chesterfield was a town we came to in 1999 and it was a little bit down and then the town centre

01:50 has had the massive resurgence, there's lots of investment been happening and we like to think

01:55 that we were in on the ground floor and we were the first cocktail bar to come to Chesterfield.

01:59 Some will say that we are the best, I'm quite happy about that and we've been pushing the

02:05 weather ever since. We think that Chesterfield has improved enormously in the last 25 years,

02:10 it's a fantastic little town and we're really pleased to be here and we're really happy to be

02:15 part of its success. But it's, you're part of the community, the lovely thing about us at

02:22 Chandler's is that we've managed to become a locals bar in the middle of town which is a very

02:27 unusual thing and it's quite a hard thing to achieve but we have succeeded with that quite

02:32 well. We've probably got a home for regulars which for a town centre pub is absolutely fantastic

02:37 and that just keeps us going, it's great. I mean for the future obviously the rooms upstairs are

02:43 going to be a massive part of that, yeah I think after 25 years it's time to hand it over. My

02:49 current manager Louise and I are currently talking about her probably possibly, probably, hopefully

02:56 taking it over. She loves Chandler's almost as much as I do and she's basically been driving

03:01 this business for the last seven, eight years so it's right and proper that she has an opportunity

03:06 to continue doing that which would be absolutely fantastic and with the rooms upstairs added on

03:11 to the pub I think it's a fantastic business opportunity for her or anybody else. My favourite

03:15 drink, I'm afraid I'm a bit of a whiskey, a bourbon drinker so my favourite drink is an old-fashioned.