Closing for a refurb? Count twice: the shutdown and reopening stock checklist

A refurb closure is an unplanned year-end. Two counts decide whether the stock side goes smoothly: a signed count the day you shut, and another the morning you reopen. Skip either and you'll spend your first month back open arguing with numbers nobody can check.

This guide covers a planned closure of a week or more, a refurb, a change of kitchen, works you can't trade through. The jobs split into four piles: running the stock down, the closing count, looking after what stays, and starting clean on the other side.

Four to six weeks out: run it down

Stock you don't have is stock you can't lose during the works. Cut your par levels hard on everything with a shelf life, and stop ordering slow lines entirely, your dead stock list is the place to start. Cask needs the most planning: a firkin is 72 pints with the mid-60s sellable in practice, and Cask Marque's rule of thumb is three days on sale once tapped, so work backwards from closing day and make the last firkin one you can actually empty. The cask ordering guide has the arithmetic.

Run the same logic on packaged stock against your reopening date, not your closing date. A case of bottled ale with ten weeks of life is fine for a two-week refurb and a problem for a ten-week one.

Closing day: the count that protects you

Do a full count, at cost, signed and dated, with every part bottle weighed rather than guessed, and take photos of the cellar and the shelves as you finish. One job, three uses:

• Your accountant. Stock sits in your accounts at the lower of cost and what it would fetch, and a closure count is the cleanest valuation point you'll ever get. The year-end valuation guide covers the basis.
• Your insurer. If anything happens during the works, the claim starts from evidence of what was there. Insurers settle stock at cost price, not retail, AXA's business stock wording says so plainly, and the insurance documentation guide lists what an adjuster will actually ask for. A signed count with photos is most of that list.
• Any audit conversation later. A stock audit that straddles a closure is noise unless both sides agree what the closing position was. Your signed count is that agreement.

During the works: what happens to the stock

Full, unbroached containers can often go back. Ask your supplier about uplifting full kegs and casks for credit before you shut; the normal trade position is that full, unopened containers get uplifted for full credit, while anything opened is at best a duty-element conversation. The ullage and duty credit guide explains who actually claims what, because the duty relief belongs to the producer and reaches you as supplier credit, not a cheque from HMRC.

What stays gets one home. Sealed, covered, off the floor, in one lockable space, counted into it on closing day and counted out on reopening day. There will be more people through the building than in a normal month, and the point of counting in and out isn't suspicion of anybody, it's that without it a discrepancy can never be dated, explained or claimed.

Ring your broker before the first wall comes down. Building works and an unoccupied building can both change what a policy covers, cover for stock deterioration varies by policy, and AXA's wording includes things worth knowing about in advance, like temporary-removal cover at 10% of the stock sum if you store some of it off site. None of that is advice, it's the list of questions: am I covered during the works, is stored stock covered, is deterioration covered if the power to the cellar goes off. Ten minutes on the phone, in writing afterwards.

Shutting the cellar down properly

Cask Marque published a bar and cellar closure guide in November 2020. It was written for lockdowns, but the mechanics of mothballing a cellar are the same for a refurb:

• Clean every line, then get the water out: blow keg lines through, pull water through cask lines. Beer or water left standing in a line for weeks is a contamination problem you'll taste at reopening.
• Gas off at the individual cylinder valves, and clean the valve parts.
• Remote coolers off, but woken every two weeks for half an hour to keep the waterways clear. If unbroached kegs are staying in the cellar, keep the cooling running for them.
• Cask kit, taps, hop filters, extractor rods, dipsticks, cleaned in sanitiser and left to air dry. Lines hung off the floor, empties corked and stored securely.
• Glasswasher drained and cleaned with the door left open, ice machine emptied and sanitised, and the cellar itself deep cleaned, then checked regularly for pests and damp while you're shut.

Reopening: your new baseline

Lines get a proper clean before the first pint, not after the first complaint. Then count everything again, same discipline as closing day. This is the same logic as the ingoing stocktake when you take a pub on: the reopening count is the baseline every future GP% and variance figure is measured from. Without it, your first month's numbers are noise, because nobody knows what you restarted with.

Restart your pars low and rebuild them from actual sales. Trade after a refurb rarely restarts at the level it left off, in either direction, and ordering to the old pars is how reopening months grow a dead stock shelf.

The checklist

Print this, stick it on the cellar door, cross things off.

When	Job	Why
4 to 6 weeks out	Cut pars, stop slow lines, plan last casks to empty within 3 days on sale	Stock you don't hold can't stale or walk
2 weeks out	Date-check packaged stock against the reopening date; supplier uplift agreed for full containers	Credit beats write-off
1 week out	Broker call: works, storage, deterioration, unoccupancy	Cover changes when the building does
Closing day	Full signed count at cost, part bottles weighed, photos; stock into one locked space, counted in	Accountant, insurer, audit: one count serves all three
Closing day	Cellar shutdown: lines cleaned and emptied, gas off at valves, coolers off, kit sanitised	Reopening tastes like the clean, not the closure
Every 2 weeks shut	Coolers on for 30 minutes; check for pests and damp	Cask Marque's keep-alive routine
Reopening day	Line clean, gas checks, full count again, counted stock out of storage	The new baseline everything is measured from
First month back	Pars rebuilt from actual sales, weekly counts	Post-refurb trade rarely matches pre-refurb pars

One illustrative sum, my arithmetic: £4,000 of stock at cost sitting through a four-week refurb. If 10% of it stales, goes out of date or quietly disappears during the works, that's £400 gone, and without the signed closing count you can't prove it happened, claim for it, or even date it.

Common questions

Do I need a professional stocktaker for the closing count?

Either works. What matters is that the count is full, at cost, signed and dated, with part bottles weighed and photos taken. A professional adds an independent signature, which helps if the closure involves a pubco or a dispute; the DIY method is fine for a straightforward refurb.

Can I send full kegs and casks back before a closure?

Ask your supplier before you shut, because terms vary. The normal trade position is full, unbroached containers uplifted for full credit, while opened containers are at best a duty-element conversation with brewer sign-off. The duty relief itself is the producer's claim; it reaches you as supplier credit.

What happens to the beer left in the lines?

It's lost, and line contents never qualify for duty credit, the same as line cleaning losses in normal trading. Clean the lines and get the water out per the Cask Marque closure steps. The cost of what was in them is part of why you plan the last week's ordering tightly.

Is the reopening count really worth a morning?

Yes, and it's the one most pubs skip. It's the opening-stock figure for every GP% and variance calculation after the refurb. Without it, your first results back are unreadable, and anything that went missing during the works is invisible forever.