When England or Scotland play in a major football tournament, most of us expect pubs to be busier. It’s almost part of the national ritual. 

But how much busier? Which places benefit the most? And are the effects the same everywhere? 

A natural experiment 

At Beauclair Data, we analysed more than 20 million pub and bar transactions with a total value of £270m across 510 retail districts (defined by the Geographic Data Service) throughout Great Britain during June. We compared sales during the six World Cup group games involving England and Scotland with sales during the same hour and day of the week when neither team was playing. The result was a unique snapshot of how different places responded to exactly the same national event. 

Some of the findings confirmed expectations. Others were genuinely surprising. 

Across Great Britain, pub and bar sales increased by 21% during home nation group games. England’s matches increased sales by 31% across England, while Scotland’s matches increased sales by 50% within Scotland, demonstrating the remarkable ability of major sporting events to influence consumer behaviour. 

Every place has its own story 

Perhaps the most interesting finding was not the overall increase, but the wide variation between places.  

Of the cities defined by the Geographic Data Service as Regional Centres, Manchester and Brighton & Hove jointly recorded the largest increase in pub and bar spending during England’s group games, both seeing sales rise by 31%. 

In Scotland, Glasgow narrowly edged Edinburgh, with sales increasing by 49% for Scotland’s World Cup group games compared with 42%. 

These are the kinds of local differences that are completely hidden within national statistics. 

Even more striking was Birmingham, which recorded a 6% decline in pub and bar sales during England’s matches compared with equivalent periods when England were not playing. 

Without detailed local data, it would be easy to assume that every city benefited equally from the tournament. The evidence tells a much more nuanced story. 

Why this matters for place managers 

Football is only the beginning. 

Every year, town and city centres invest considerable time and money in initiatives designed to attract visitors and increase spending. Christmas lights are switched on. Food festivals are organised. Markets, concerts, cultural events and sporting occasions are promoted. Roads are closed for public events, while changes car parking costs and the accessibility of roads alter how people use town centres. 

The question is always the same: 

Did it actually make a difference? 

Traditionally, answering that question has been difficult. Footfall counters tell us how many people visited, but not whether they spent money. Business surveys are valuable but inevitably partial. Anecdotal feedback can be useful, but rarely provides robust evidence. 

Retail transaction data offers another perspective. By measuring actual consumer spending, it allows place managers to assess the economic impact of events with far greater precision. 

Just as importantly, it enables comparisons. Was the increase larger than similar towns? Was spending concentrated in pubs and restaurants, or spread across the wider high street? Did local residents respond differently from visitors? Did the event simply shift spending from one day to another, or generate genuinely additional economic activity? 

These are questions that increasingly shape decisions about future investment. 

Evidence instead of assumptions 

One of the most valuable lessons from the World Cup analysis is that assumptions can be misleading. 

Many people would have expected every large English city to experience a similar increase in spending during England’s matches. In reality, the differences between places were substantial. 

For organisations responsible for managing town centres, that reinforces an important principle: local evidence is almost always more valuable than national averages. 

Every place has its own mix of residents, visitors, businesses, transport links and visitor economy. Understanding those local patterns is essential if investment decisions are to be based on evidence rather than intuition. 

We’d be happy to share your local results 

If you work in economic development for a local authority or for a Business Improvement District, we’d be delighted to share the World Cup pub and bar analysis for your own retail district. 

We’ll provide a short snapshot showing: 

  • Your area’s results during the England and Scotland group games. 
  • How your retail district compared with similar places. 
  • The national benchmark. 

About Beauclair Data

Beauclair Data provides insights from retail transaction data to Business Improvement Districts, local authorities and other public bodies. The data comes a strictly anonymised GB-wide data-set of consumer debit and credit card transactions, with about 5 million transactions added each day. 

The geographic definitions of retail districts cited in this article come from a database compiled by the Geographic Data Service (GeoDS) which is hosted by UCL and the universities of Edinburgh, Liverpool and Oxford, and which is part of Smart Data Research UK’s (SDR UK) mission to unlock the power of data to improve lives.