Halifax business partners set-up virtual bar to keep their regulars entertained

A virtual bar has been set-up by Jessica and Michael Ainsworth and Andrew Murphy of the Grayston Unity and the Meandering Bear in Halifax.
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The idea is to keep customers connected and provide them with some entertainment during the coronavirus lockdown.

Michael Ainsworth said: “I own the Grayston Unity in town, and with my business partners, have the Meandering Bear.

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“We could see what was going to be happening in terms of closures so we had a think about it and because of the nature of what we do is about community as much as anything, it just seemed us to build a website and do something to keep people entertained or connected.

Jessica Ainsworth, Michael Ainsworth and Andrew Murphy from The Grayston Unity and Meandering BearJessica Ainsworth, Michael Ainsworth and Andrew Murphy from The Grayston Unity and Meandering Bear
Jessica Ainsworth, Michael Ainsworth and Andrew Murphy from The Grayston Unity and Meandering Bear

“We talked to regulars who said it’d be nice to have some way of keeping in touch, so it seemed a good thing to do.

“We update the programme for the week Sundays or Mondays, and we’ve had live music every week which is what the Grayston’s partly known for. We had Gordon McKinnie who did a set live from Oklahoma.

“We use Zoom for certain things and also the Meandering Bear Facebook live page.

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“Next week we’ve got opera on Saturday night and Craig Fee, who’s from Halifax but left to go teaching in China, he’s a musician as well so he’s doing a live set from China next Sunday.

“We have a quiz every week and we’ve done yoga, spoken word once a fortnight.

“We’ve got some talking heads theatre coming up in a week or two, loads of stuff.

“Once or twice a week we open Zoom up, always on a Friday, we call it After Work, half five to half six, for people to go on via the website. The only condition is everyone has a drink in their hand.

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“It does lift spirits because it’s quite hard to keep going. We’ve got to get through it somehow.”

Michael said the response to the idea has been positive.

“It’s been great,” he said. “We usually get 30 to 40 people for the music and the quiz, sometimes it’s regulars or sometimes different people.
“I think we had about 1,000 hits in the first week, interestingly Halifax was obviously at the top, but about fourth or fifth was New York, I’m not quite sure why.

“There’s a band called The Burning Hell, from Nova Scotia, near the Halifax over there, and they did a 10 minute video of songs which we put on the website, which are dedicated to our Halifax, which was a really nice thing to do.”

Michael admits he is concerned about the long-term impact the coronavirus pandemic could have on the bar and restaurant sector in Calderdale.

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He added: “For us and other bars and restaurants, it’s going to be a long haul, it’s not going to be a three-month thing.

“We’re not massively optimistic in terms of how soon we’ll be allowed to open and then when we do, how it’s going to be.

“I think it’s going to be a good 12 months before anything remotely gets back to normal.

“Everyone in the industry has been helped with the grants, which is great, but that’s only going to go so far.

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“Halifax is definitely going to lose businesses, I can’t see anyway round that unfortunately.”

For more details on the virtual bar, visit www.graystonbear.com.

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